Tuesday, January 6, 2009

when it rains, it pours!

a few months back, greg won a cd/dvd/mp3/stereo system complete with 6 (count 'em, 6!) speakers. then, a few days ago, my parents gifted us their old tv (circa 1996). they just decided they wanted a new one, ho hum. it's a 26". ours currently is a 13" or 19", i can't remember, but it is much smaller.

anyway, we set up the new tv (putting the smaller one into storage in case it breaks) and have been using our old dvd player which works ok but the remote died on. well, the past few days, i've been noticing the dvds are skipping and losing sound and i got fed up with waiting for greg to find the time to set up the new system so i did this am.

let me tell you, it rocks! i'm not a technically freak by any means but when i put carole king into the system and hit 'surround', even sage was shakin' his bootie to the music.

the only downside is we'll be giving up a 5 cd changer for this thing (i'm going to put the old stereo upstairs) but i think we'll live!

not bad for free!

speaking of other freebies, some not so good ones are the gifts my mil dumped on her grandkids...lots of plastic crap....sage got a firetruck that makes noise and flashes lights and is 100% plastic and jaden got a plastic baby doll (head, arms and legs) with a stuffed body that cries, has a bunch of plastic accessories including a bottle and pacifier! and polyester clothing. they both love these toys and sage tries to steal the baby from jaden. i am dismayed that she bought that crap. she knows we hate the stuff. greg has told her to buy wood toys or real cotton fabric type stuff. i'm not sure if she's just ignorant or hateful. i haven't figured it out yet. i hope the enthusiasim dies for them quickly so they can disappear. we've had 4 years of success of keeping cheap china made toys out of our house for the most part, i want to keep it that way.

oh, and a goal i forgot to add is to cool it on the sailor characteristics! :P

4 comments:

Gina said...

You've done much better than me-both my mom and my in-laws flood these kids with china made crap. I have a goal to start purging and from us this year there were no china toys.

That's great on the freebees!

It's me said...

We got a 53" HighDef TV from some friends who were taking it to the dump because it kept shutting off.

Husband spent a couple of hours learning to solder those little circuit-y things and $20 worth of parts and guess what... YUP. TV HELL!!! Or HEAVEN for Husband at least. But I do like nearly free!

Good luck on the mil thing. That sucks. We always got cash, thank goodness.

Judy T said...

Great luck with the freebies!
Too bad about the MIL and the gifts. We get the same thing from my MIL- or at least did when the children were younger. My youngest (8) still got plastic 'Moon shoes'- interesting concept- I'll see how long they last once the weather warms up. My parents have always been very good about giving more practical gifts. Last year my Mom made matching bathrobes for V and the boys. This year all the grandkids except my youngest got cookbooks- he got food.
Judy

Anonymous said...

Hi Tansy,
Our toys are the same way and like your house, plastic came into the house this season.

I even went to the effort to send everyone a little note to remind them and a list of things my Granddaughter would love to have.

I think it was done because the offenders couldn't take the time to look around for something acceptable and the fact that they think I'm a bit "Wacky" for not letting her live with plastic in her life. They made their own judgement in that the toy was acceptable in their mind not ours.

I feel your frustration and like you hope the toys break or get tossed aside soon.

One offending little baby went right back to where it came from the very next day when we went for a visit and "forgot" to take it home with us. I got a call when I got home that we had forgot it and my answer was, why don't you keep it at your house for next time we visit so we will have something to play with while we are there...One less thing to "remember" would be great.

This left the offender feeling I was indeed "dumb" and she was happy to take the responsibility of the dear doll's safe keeping.

:)

Have a great day.
~Karyn

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