g,How the Easter Bunny has brought me to tears

[mattsmom27]

So I am living on a fixed income, very low income. Pay to pay definitly, fancy budgeting, you know what I mean I'm sure.
Anyhow, I did the Easter Bunny shopping and stashed it in my bedroom closet where easy child knows she is never allowed to go into. I didn't want to tell her that the bike she was getting from me for Easter had to wait till the week after Easter because I have no more money. So I told her that she can come with me to pick out her bike, but since she'll be spending the first half of Easter weekend with her dad, and then because on the Sunday and Monday the stores are closed, we would instead the weekend after Easter go bike shopping. Phew! I thought that was clever of me, and left a happy easy child. I always do a bigger gift like a bike or whatever as a gift at Easter because it kills 2 birds with one stone. I can't afford other stuff AND a bike, so thus she gets a bike most years if she has outgrown her last one.
So here I am with under 20 bucks until the week AFTER easter. And what happens? Her and her friend from next door were playing Playstation on the t.v. in my room, friend opens closet, voila, Easter Bunny heaven! So easy child was in tears because it spoiled the "suprise that you got me stuff for Easter AND I'm getting a bike" (*yikes* canNOT do that!!! :frown: ). Little does she know that there really was nothing for Easter from me, just the bike the following week as we had discussed. So now she's expecting this stuff in the closet from me, and of course the Easter Bunny making an appearance. Well there isnt' going to be an Easter Bunny unless there is a money tree nearby that is goign to start spitting money my way.
So yup .... I've been brought down by the Easter Bunny (kinda sorta).
I admit I had a small cry over this in the bathroom because it feels like crap to be so budgeted to the wire that there is nothing saved for little moments like this. I could have pretended that wasnt' Easter stuff, but early shopping for her birthday that I'd hidden ... but that doesn't change nothing from the Easter Bunny.
Is there a Grinch alternative for Easter? Or an Ebeneezer for Easter? I say bah humbug now!
I even considered taking this stuff back to the store, but it is stuff she has to have, again with the kill to birds with one stone. THere is a bag full of clothes she desperatly needs but I figured coming from the bunny means not having to buy from the bunny AND get her new clothes. There is the chocolates etc that I can't pawn off on her birthday. There is the new hockey stick (she plays hockey for those who don't know) that she needed anyhow but didn't think I'd get her till next season.
For once I wish I could curse here without censor :frown:

No need to respond, just needed to vent this all out before I start stupidly crying again. What is they say? No sense crying over spilled milk? True. Yet I can't clean up the spill this time.

Melissa

 

[mum2JK&TH]

Did she see everything? Is it possible to salvage some of it for the Easter bunny? I remember there was one thing that difficult child wanted and we had to buy it right then and there but it was supposed to be from Santa. We told him that Santa was worried that he wouldn't have enough so he asked us to get it for him just in case. So it was still from Santa and we actually told him that Santa ended up having enough so we took the one we got back and the one he got was indeed from Santa.

 

[TerryJ2]

Can you trade candy and baskets with-another mom so it looks different?
So sorry for your conundrum. Sheesh.
Well, she gets the bike anyway, right? She'll have to be happy she gets it and learn to live with-the lack of surprise.
Good luck!

 

[crazymama30]

I get very anti holiday sometimes, seems that everything is about "things". I hide things over at my mom's house in our camper trailer. They have never been found there, yet.

 

[Lothlorien]

Trading is an excellent idea!!!!

Perhaps you can half the stuff that you have and trade it off with another mom with different stuff!

 

[mom_in_training]

I like the trading idea if you can find a willing parent. My difficult child when she was much younger discovered where I kept the goods. I put a lock on my closet door and that stopped that real quick. I hate that when they ruin the surprise by finding the stuff, It really messes up everything. I'm sorry that your soooo sad but I think that you will figure out something. I soooo know what its like to be limited financially but you know I think that when we have to struggle that some of us can get pretty creative. Do you do easter egg hunts with your kiddos? In my difficult children later years we would color the eggs together the night before and have our neighbor hide the eggs outside. A couple were plastic eggs that she would find a prize in be it money or something special like a necklace or whatever.

 

[JJJ]

My kiddos are also going to be a tad disappointed this Easter. In the past the bunny has always brought one cool gift and a basket filled with candy and small toys. This year there is no money for it. And with the way they trashed their stuff this past year, I don't want to spend money on them.

Any chance her dad would help the bunny out?

 

[mattsmom27]

thank you all for your suggestions. I had a fleeting thought of calling easy child's father, but I say fleeting because he's being a total difficult child right now and I'm not getting sucked in by him. Unfortunate but the way it is :frown:
As for swapping with someone, it is a brilliant idea. The problem is that I tried this year to minimize "treats" so the bunny was bringing some small foil eggs to hide for a hunt and one special boxed chocolate bunny (I may be trading the boxed bunny and the type of foil eggs I bought with my cousin, seems her son went snooping too!!!). So that part is good. I did not do a "basket" because of finances. I sort of had to kill two birds with one stone. easy child has grown so much and reallllly needed new clothes. So I bought several outfits and a spring jacket from the bunny, along with a new hockey stick. She assumes after seeing that stuff in the closet that it is from me. So basically I can't return any of it because first, she's expecting it, and second because this is stuff she needs (the clothes). So she will get them as gifts from me. And the bunny will have eggs to hide and a boxed chocolate, I plan to tell her that the chocolates she saw in the closet were part of easter gift for neice/nephew. That should work. Now I just have the dilemma that she knows the easter bunny brings gifts. Not huge gifts. She would have been shocked had it worked out and she'd gotten all these clothes from the bunny since normally it would be the stick, the chocolates, and perhaps some dollar store stuff such as skipping rope, sidewalk chalk etc.
But in keeping with the theory of a basket, perhaps I will go for broke (I mean flat broke LOL) and get her a bunch of outdoor/spring stuff from the dollar store and put it in a basket for her.
I guess really this isn't the end of the world, but it is hard to find something where there's nothing. I'm going to look at the glass half full, all bills get paid on time every time, we eat well, we have a nice home. I'm broke. Oh well. We meet our needs. That is more than most!
Going to use power of positive thinking this morning LOL

Melissa

 

[busywend]

Sidewalk chalk and bubbles were always in the basket when difficult child was little. Those can be pretty cheap.

 

[mistmouse]

I can understand how this can make you feel. I thought I was home safe this year on the Easter Bunny since difficult child is 12. I have no money for even one tiny treat. My bills have been juggled for years to pay them all, and some are as the disconnect notice comes. We live on my daughter's SSI and a few food stamps and I am often struggling to feed us the last few days before time for food stamps. This month I had to register my car to continue to drive, so an extra expense. So, I had informed difficult child that this year she wouldn't get a new Easter dress and shoes, that she would have to wear something she already has. I kind of fobbed that off on that she is growing and since she is in puberty is likely to take a big growth spurt in the next year and the dress wouldn't get used much. She was fine with that, but then said, "I will still have my Easter basket. Maybe the Easter Bunny will bring me that movie I have been wanting." There is not even money for the grass in the basket, much less a movie, and the food stamps are already gone so can't even get a candy to give her.

So, I understand your feelings, and maybe it would be worse if you had already figured out how to get her what she needed and then she found out. I wasn't able to get anything in the first place. However, that isn't what Easter is about anyway, is it?

This past year has been a lot about teaching difficult child that life isn't fair, what with all that has been going on at school and such. Her therapist and I finally decided that the SD is not going to change, so we just have to teach difficult child how to deal with it. So, I guess no Easter basket is one more lesson for my 12 going on 8 year old.

mistmouse

 

[livinginazoo]

I'm sorry your going through this, an idea that I have done in the past is to take some of my kids old clothes and toys to a consinment shop. It helps clear some of the old clutter and gets a little bit of cash to help out for whatever reason. And as much as I hate to ask for help, sometimes community organizations and churches help out with x-mas, thanksgiving, easter ect. Maybe that is something you could look into. I know I'm stressed this year, Easters Sunday and easy child's birthday on Thursday. Haven't even started shopping for either since I don't get paid till Friday.

 

[mistmouse]

Thanks livinginazoo if the response was to my plight. I am in a small rural town and we have no consignment shops. As for help from community organizations, no help there. Three times now I have asked for help from every organization in order to keep my utilities turned on, and there was no help. The way they work here is to take your information and then call around to churches in the area to see if they can help pay a bill, but if you are on a disconnect notice then there isn't time for that to happen. The only help I have had on that was the annual LIHEAP. As for my own church, they are still paying off the shingles they bought on credit to redo half my roof that was leaking severely. I had a ceiling about to fall in and not enough buckets to catch the leaks. Also, when a neighborhood vandal/thief decided to start a fire in my car my church paid for the new windshield I needed. My brother did all the other cleanup work so I would have my car. I am lucky that the doors close instead of standing open so that when the vandal put the cardboard box in my driver's seat and lit it that the door shut so the fire didn't get enough oxygen to gut my car or worse. So, I have exhausted any help from my church, and the other help would be long past Easter if it did result in any help.

It will be okay. She is 12, and life isn't fair, so she is finding that out earlier than I might have liked. Thanks for the suggestions and for thinking of us.

mistmouse

 

[mom_in_training]

Discovered this site for kids..... Allot of crafty ideas for you and your kiddos for easter. Look at the site, You will see that some of these lil projects can be done with things that you might have around the house.

http://www.KidsSoup.com

 

[Lothlorien]

I have an idea. It may or may not be a good one. Do you know anyone who has candy molds? Email some of your friends....Maybe someone has one or two molds that you could borrow. I buy bags of chocoolate for about $1.64 when they go on sale and mold them. I just made some bunnies and stuff. My aunt gave me some old molds that she had. I have a box of molds that I collect each year. I usually make chocolate lollipops for the kids classes parties.