Bad Hair Day Barbies

OK, so why am I such a fish out of water out here in Pleasant Valley? It's a nice enough place. Good schools, lots of churches. A little shopping, and even a few trees. What's wrong with that?

I think it's because I became a stay at home mom very suddenly, and didn't really mean at first to give up my career. So I spent the first six months telling anyone that I was introduced to that I was an attorney. This either intimidated or disgusted most of them, and of course I got the, "but you don't LOOK like an attorney!" exclamation that I have gotten all my life. Of course, it's hard to look like much of anything when there is baby spit up on your clothes or you haven't had a shower in two days (right, new moms?) Add to that being a twin mom of twins with some medical complications and no, I didn't look much like an attorney, did I???

I am overeducated for a mom, but so is half of Pleasant Valley, especially in my fancy neighborhood. We have former CPAs who serve as Girl Scout cookie moms. Former marketing executives run church luncheons and work on their kids' kindergarten projects (and sometimes their kids' high school projects too!) That kind of thing. But I was SOMEBODY academically. Great college, top grades. Top ten law school out of state. Phi Beta Kappa. In lots of honoraries with Greek Letters. Even as an attorney I am a pointy headed geek (this was one attorney's nickname for me). I am Detail-Oriented. I am told I am not a Big Picture Person (ever been told that at work)? I don't believe this--I just believe that because I am so Detail-Oriented and can't shut up about it, people THINK I'm not a Big Picture Person.

OK, so now here I am in Pleasant Valley, an attorney (I refuse to say "former attorney" because I AM still an attorney, just a non-practicing one). Guess what I did yesterday? I played with Bad Hair Day Barbies.

It is Consignment Sale time, and now I am regretting all the things that I dumped on charity for free in December. The truth is I am at heart a Scot and that mean's I'm cheap. I like giving to charity as long as it's something I can't wring any cash from. Well, in December I was desperate to move one of my daughters to her own room (so that at age 10 they could both learn to maintain rooms, put away clothes, etc. and I wouldn't have to do it all the time). So I got rid of LOTS of stuff in her room and in my husband's warehouse....excuse me, office. Stuff I should have held on to for Consignment.

We have a huge Consignment Sale here in Pleasant Valley called Divine Consign (yes, they had a competition for the name and some marketing executive mom probably won). I have made a lot of money from this sale in the past but it's a real pain in the tail to consign in. You have to type up tags that are run on a particular kind of cardstock, describing your lovely used items. Everything in like new, pristine condition. No stains, tears or rips, or you will get THREE STRIKES and be out of the consignment world forever. Working batteries in all your toys. You get the idea. It is a great sale to shop and it is great to get those checks, but getting ready for it is very labor intensive. The worst part is the part you have to do anyway if you have kids--clean out all the closets and find all the kid crap you can live without. And then tag it and secretly spirit it out of the house before the kids find out. I always tell them it's in the attic. And sometimes it really is, and I just THINK I sold it the last time.

Yes, that stupid Lego table that is impossible to lift is in fact STILL up there in the attic, and I guess I am going to have to bite the bullet and strain my back or break my ankle or something to take it to consignment and get rid of it. Maybe Once Upon a Child would take it? Then I could get my husband to take it! That's where I got it from. I got it years ago when I thought I was going to get my girls lots of Unisex toys so they could learn to use legos and become engineers and meet lots of guys (the best way to meet guys is to become an engineer or a computer geek. If you become a lawyer you also meet guys, but a higher percentage of them are jerks. And it requires more education to become a lawyer, so you meet even more jerks that way.)

Well, the legos didn't work out and so I turned the top upside down and for years they used it for Barbies. Now they have American Girl dolls and Zhu Zhu pets and, because they are in the 4th Grade, not any real time to actually play with anything, so the girls told me I could sell the Barbies. Even the Barbie house!!!

Getting the Barbie House and convincing my husband to buy it years ago was a major ordeal (original price was $120, got it for $80, this is the type of trivia my mind is cluttered with). He had to go and get it after work and he got the last one with a coupon. I got a second one from a friend a few years ago and for a while we had dueling Barbie homes( if you put them together then in the middle you had a Renaissance courtyard kind of thing going on), But they were huge, so we sold one of them at consignment the last time.

I am trying to decide if in this economy I dare put $50 on the Barbie House, because I only get 2/3 at Consignment. But it might still sell even though it is not Christmas. Some idiot will pay $50 for a used Barbie House in great shape; I would. After all, it would save you $30 to $60 long term, right? And then you can re-sell it in Consignment if your kids don't ruin it. This is the kind of trivia my mind is cluttered with.

Anyway, I am now sorting out the Barbies and the clothes, and most of them are having a Bad Hair Day. So when I can I am brushing and fixing up the hair and rinsing it out in water when it is straight, and I have about ten naked Barbie dolls on the drying rack in the downstairs bathroom. It looks like a Barbie Spa. Then, of course, because there are about a million of the little devils and about two million evening dresses (our Barbies were very fashionable), I can't finish in one day. So now the girls have seen them sitting out on a table, and now they are changing their minds about selling them. Plus I still have to buy big ziplocks to put them in, etc. etc. and iron some of the clothes and fix them up so that they look like new and I can charge more money for them. I would like to get them looking good enough that I could put $8 to $9 each on them without people laughing at me. Most of them cost $17 to $25 NIB (New in Box) and I want some of my money back.

So, Bad Hair Day Barbies. This is what my life is coming to. And I can tell you, Mattel makes really cheap hair. Some of these gals have barely been played with and spent most of their lives on plastic Barbie couches looking ornamental, and they still have the frizzies. My own Barbies from 30 to 40 years ago (some were antiques) look a whole lot better and they were played with a lot more.

My girls never really got into Barbies, other than acquiring them. But the LOVE the American Girl Dolls, which I am afraid is my secret (and not so secret) obsession too. I have had to quit my ebay addiction again. My mom sent me some money for my birthday for clothes and I did spend it on clothes--discontinued clothes for American Girl dolls! I am truly obsessed, and I really shouldn't be spending my money on such things, so I have had to quit for a while. But not before I got both Kaya's Jingle Dress and the Pow Wow Dress for Today. Ok, what's a bored lawyer to do? I used to collect Fostoria American glassware (want to buy some???) Now I collect doll clothes. For my kids to play with. How sick is that?????

So, back to my adventures with Bad Hair Day Barbies and Consignment Mania. See you soon! Let me know if anyone is out there reading or if I am just being self-indulgent as usual.

Pleasant Valley Mom