The Christmas Story Continued

So now that everyone knows how Chris got his Christmas present, and how awesome I am for buying it and surprising him, I bet you're anxious to find out about the rest of our Christmas fun.  It wasn't intentional, but somehow, every gift came with a story.  In no particular order, the big reveal.


Benjy was so happy that Imaginext had joined with Toy Story 3 to make this toy that I had to buy it while it was still available (and on sale!) at Toys R Us in Virginia. Of course what I hadn't realized about that awesome sale price was that I was going to spend all my savings shipping it to ourselves in Mexico. We actually ended up shipping three boxes to ourselves since we overestimated the amount of crap we could stuff into the SUV. That was a $60 lesson we'll try not to repeat at future pack outs.


Jacob was surprised on Christmas morning by this AT-AT from Star Wars. He had asked for Star Wars action figures, so I had bought and shipped some, but then we realized that was all I had bought for him for Christmas. I could just hear the crying on Christmas morning when Benjy's gift was bigger and better than Jacob's.  So on our first trip back to the U.S. with our sponsor to buy cleaning supplies, food and other essentials, we made a mad dash through Wal-mart and decided on this pricey toy. 

Relieved to have something to give the kid for Christmas, we headed out to Chris's tiny car, which we had just picked up from the car shipper, and tried to finagle a mop, a broom, a Swiffer, enough groceries to last a week, plus the huge box containing this monstrous toy into the tiny trunk and tiny interior. And then Chris's tiny car refused to crank, even a tiny bit.

It was dead, because someone (I'm not going to mention any names, but it is a manual transmission, and everyone knows that I can't drive a stick) had left the lights on. And then that same someone didn't want to ask for any help, even when a woman was clearly willing to give his car a jump. Finally, my nagging and her insistence wore someone's pride down, and he accepted assistance, and we were able to go back to Mexico. I'm not sure how that someone pictured us getting out of that situation, but there was no way I was going to be the one pushing the car, no matter how tiny it is.

Isn't this just the cutest picture?  This Mexican guitar was probably the biggest hit on Christmas. We bought it while waiting in the line to cross the border on another trip to San Diego.  The lines to the border were super long just before Christmas, which meant I had lots of time to see what the guys standing in the middle of the street were peddling. They had blankets and fireworks and statues of the Virgin Mary, and I was excited to see each item. No matter how many times Chris yelled at me to stop looking excited and to stop making eye contact, I just couldn't help myself. Besides, what else were we supposed to do while waiting in line. Talk to each other? That's overrated.

So vendor after vendor knocked on Chris's window trying to talk him into buying something for "the lady." I thought it was fantastic; Chris was annoyed. But when I saw the cutest little guitars for sale, I just had to find out how much they cost. So reluctantly, Chris rolled down his window and asked.

"$45," the guy said.

"$45 pesos?" Chris asked, excited.

"No!" the guy said. "U.S. dollars. You want pesos? I take 700 pesos."

"700 pesos," Chris said with disgust. "Look man, I've got 100 pesos."

"100 pesos?" the guy said, equally disgusted. "That's like 6 bucks. No way."

Chris rolled up his window, but the guy wouldn't leave. It's probably because I was still making eye contact. I really wanted that little guitar for the boys.

Chris sighed and rolled his window down again.

"How much you have U.S. dollars?" the guy asked hopefully.

Chris tried once again to barter. "I have 300 pesos. That's it. That's all I can give you."

The guy snatched the money from Chris's hand, and the next moment I was holding the little guitar. Benjy and Andrew slept through the entire transaction, and we made Jacob promise not to tell. We probably still got a bad deal since we paid roughly $23 for the guitar, but we had bartered, and we had won. But more importantly, we had passed the time in the border line.


Andrew's Christmas is a sad story. You see, I forgot to buy C batteries for his toy, and so he couldn't play with it on Christmas. Bad mommy. But Andrew didn't care. He put stuff in his mouth. He played with the boxes. And he attacked the camera. He loved his Christmas.


As for me, I got this bottle of perfume from my sweetie. I hope it's not because I've been smelling bad.

In other Christmas news, we successfully pulled off two more mooches, this time using the classic "we're new in a foreign country and don't know anyone" appeal. It worked like a charm, and both sets of hosts were fabulous.

Plus, I cooked a ham, which we've been eating ever since. I'm really starting to run out of recipes for leftover ham though. We've had ham sandwiches, ham omelets, ham burgers (because it was on a bun and therefore not a sandwich), ham tacos, and ham tetrazzini. I don't think we'll eat ham again until next Christmas.