I Got A Barbie For Christmas

Yea, you read that right.

I got an awesome Barbie for Christmas.  Yep, it was for me, and yep, I asked for it.

Why should I break a good Christmas tradition?

Our first Christmas together in 1986, I asked my husband for a Cabbage Patch Doll.  I knew we were a match made in Heaven when he asked for a Stomper Truck. Remember the battery operated pick-up that could drive over a stack of books?  It was one of those great Christmases where we both got the exactly what we wanted.

When we started our family we had kids to buy toys for. Those were the best years,  when they were  young and  didn’t want clothes or electronics.  I loved buying them toys as much as they loved getting them.

Then came the dreaded time when our kids outgrew toys.  Seriously?  Who outgrows toys?  Apparently, my children did. 

So, I went back to buying toys for myself.  My husband once joked that I musta’ had a deprived childhood.  No, my childhood Christmases were magical, I always got that one special toy that made my heart happy.  We weren’t spoiled, my parents didn’t run up debts and produce selfish children, but they worked hard to provide the one thing each child wanted.

Toys proved dreams could come true.

That’s why I love toys.

See?  We’re all lined up, ecstatic over our Christmas gifts.  (L to R, Lee, Joel, Me, Allan, Laurie, Angie) OK,  Angie, looks scared, but I think it’s because she’s almost falling off the piano bench. Allan isn’t holding his toy, I think he already dismantled it, as he did every Christmas, trying to figure out how it worked.  He’s a Construction Engineer now, but has no toys left from his childhood.

In 1st grade, I was given the Malibu Barbie. She came with a fringed yellow towel, sunglasses and a blue swimming suit.  

In 2nd grade, I got Malibu Ken. 

In 3rd grade Malibu Skipper was added to my collection.

In 4th grade it was the Cut and Curl Barbie.

In 5th grade my Barbies could go camping, because I received the Barbie Camper Bus.

The best year of all?  In 6th grade I got the Barbie camping set AND the Sunshine Family.  The Sunshine Family has become the Ingalls family this year as I homeschool Rebekah through the Little House on the Prairie books. Guess Mom really scored that year, I am STILL playing with those toys.

This is my new Barbie.

She’s styling my kinda’ clothes, skinny jeans, high heels, a jacket and a huge purse.  The purse has a notebook computer in it, of course.

But, I named her Novelist Barbie, ‘cuz she’s a writer, ya’ know.  That’s why she wears cool clothes and carries a computer everywhere she goes, just like me.  (the computer, not the cool)

I chose her for inspiration.

Not that I’ll ever look like that again, I really don’t care that when I sit down this smooshy stuff, my tummy, lands in my lap. I just tuck it into my waistband and pretend it isn’t there.

It’s not just her clothes and her computer that inspire, it’s the moto she’s posing by. I know she’s saying,“It’s never too late to be what you might have been.” George Eliot

I’m nearing 50, I’ve almost  finished raising my six children, I’ve had cancer three times, and have suffered innumerable tragedies and disappointments that I’ve allowed to  derail my ambitions in life.

Never again.

I wanna’ write.

As Anne of Green Gables said, it’s time to dust off my ambitions.

My Novelist Barbie is the perfect Christmas toy to remind me that dreams still can come true.