Recession Proof Doll Mania

This past weekend, 8 little squirrels had the time of their lives on a one-day whirlwind trip up north. What started out as a plan for my girls to get to the go to the American Girl store to fix their poor little Bitty Twins' hair that they had completely ghetto-fied (evidently curly doll hair, lots of brushing, and various and sundry colored elastic bands throughout do not a great doll hair-do make!) compounded to add in sisters Renee and Susan plus my mom and six additional girls. That's right...if you are counting, eight girls under the age of 10 were awoken at O Dark Thirty to board the train.

They excitedly clutched their dolls and snacked on the 2 1/2 hour ride up there. It looked like a game of Musical Chairs on the Rails as they changed seats more often than I could blink. The conductors on the train were great, asking about the dolls and giving fake tickets to the dolls so they could ride back on the train. At one point, Kate asked the conductor if he was a police man, which caused him to smirk.

We arrived in the Big City and Susan proceeded to get us onto the right bus to get to the American Girl store.

And then all chaos broke loose. I thought perhaps going after school had started and on a rainy day would mean the store would be less crowded. I thought wrong. I thought since the country is in a recession, unemployment is up, and people are watching their spending, they would not be packed into a non-essential store like American Girl. I thought wrong. Every possible shape of mom (and a few dads) and girl were in there. Some were hauling several dolls plus matching outfits (and human sized outfits to match) up to the register with a determined look. These dolls run $95 - $114 apiece! And the matching girl/doll pajamas are $54. A single outfit for a doll costs $26 - $34. I love my kids but seriously! They wouldn't even have an American Girl doll if their aunts hadn't taken pity on them and bought them for them for Christmas. I held my girls to getting their dolls' hair fixed and one outfit. I admit, I was tempted to purchase more but I realized I would blink and my girls would be in junior high, convinced that their mom was SO uncool and that these expensive dolls (and their outfits) would be relegated to storage.

On to a brief stop at the Disney store and a 2 mile walk back to the train station. On the way home, the girls again played Musical Chairs combined with inadvertently dropping most of their snacks on the ground. If they had been Hansel and Gretel, I could have found them anywhere based on the train of smashed pretzels and chips left behind.

Other than a brief incident where Grace and Elisabeth accidentally opened the train bathroom door to reveal a Man in Green doing his "bidness" (and I just happened to be sitting in his direct line of sight so I got an eyeful) and another elderly gentlemen doing who knows what in the bathroom that caused a smell so bad, we ducked our heads inside our shirts like turtles and gasped for air (mental note to self: next time, don't sit next to the bathrooms), we arrived worn out and determined that next time, we'd do this trip with less kids and more caffeine!