| Tonight my boyfriend and I went through our stuff (and his kids' stuff), doing a mass purge of things to sell at a garage sale to benefit Haiti that his daughter's Girl Scout troop is selling. We purposely did this while the girls were at their mother's house, because if they saw what we were giving away, we'd be in trouble. That's particularly true for the younger daughter, a toddler. His older daughter has gone through her stuffed animals before (at my suggestion), setting aside the ones she doesn't play with anymore to donate to charity.
But, now that we've gone through piles of books, dolls, doll clothes, plastic animals, stuffed animals, My Little Ponies, Barbies, toy hair brushes, dress up jewelry, etc, I really wish the kids could have been here. For example, we found we had eight pairs of dress up shoes for the younger daughter. Many were nearly identical. We gave away four. Even after giving away half, she still has an excess of dress up shoes. Same from everything else. Only for books and clothes are we giving away things the kids have actually grown out of. Everything else is just excess. It really speaks volumes about the lives we lead here in America, that we are giving away four pairs of extra dress up shoes (and keeping four) to raise money for people in a country where nobody has basic needs like food. I hope there's a way to help the kids see that. We are truly blessed in this country, and we don't even know it. |
