Part of the Gift is how you Give it

I don’t recall many childhood memories vividly, but the morning I got my first Cabbage Patch Kid is one I do. I was about 8 years old, maybe I was 9 or 10 (okay so that detail isn’t so vivid). I really wanted a Cabbage Patch Kid, it was at the height of the craze and stores everywhere were sold out. One night I went to bed on my floor. I was going through a phase where I enjoyed sleeping on the floor of my bedroom and when I awoke in the morning the first thing I saw was a boxed CPK doll staring me back in the face. I was so happy. I appreciated and loved that doll more than any other and remember changing her clothes every day as if she were real. I still have Lillith Louella and when I play dolls with my daughter she reminds me that this one’s “mine”.

My daughter wanted a dolphin pillow pet so bad that every time we went to the store and saw one she would carry it in the cart and love on it all around the store. We always put it back and I would say, “Maybe you’ll get one for your birthday.” After several similar trips to stores I changed my story to, “If we buy it now you won’t get it for your birthday, then what will I buy you?” Needless to say she knew she was getting it for her 5^th birthday. So, I knew I would buy her another present, but was not the least bit excited about giving her the pillow pet. What fun is it to give a gift if the recipient is expecting it?

So, I thought back to how Lillith was brought into my life and this past Friday she awoke on her fifth birthday staring into the eyes of a dolphin pillow pet.