My little brother and sister are now the proud, giddy, deliriously happy owners of a Nintendo Wii game system. They saved their pennies and nickles (literally!) and finally came up with enough of their own money to buy a Wii, something they’ve wanted for a long time.

My husband bought it for them yesterday, and my little brother met him in the driveway, eagerly asking if he had found them a system.

Since Tommy set it up for them, I think my little brother has only stopped playing long enough to eat and sleep. He’s already asked me for fresh batteries for the Wiimote twice. Thank goodness we have rechargeable double As.

So the temptation to mark this as done is surfacing… but I’m not convinced quite yet. The insanity is definitely ebbing, but I’m going to wait just a bit more to be sure. 2 years ago

I was just thinking the other day that although they still adore their toys, the obsession seems to have tapered off.

Hahahahahaha!

I had lost the upload cord for my digital camera, back in March. I’ve looked EVERYWHERE for the cord, and I just haven’t been able to find it. Fine. I really need my camera, so I ordered a replacement cord online last week. It arrived two days ago in the mail in an oversized box. Keep in mind the cord, when all wrapped up, can fit in my hand (and I don’t have large hands.) The box it arrived in is 9×6x6”!

Okay, well, whatever. I had my cord and I was happy. My little brother didn’t know what it was, and as they had been the ones to see my mail, they were curious. When I saw them next, my little brother asked me what I thought was a strange question. “Did you open your mail yet?” “Yeah, of course I did. Why – ::gasp:: You thought it was a Webkinz, didn’t you!”

My little brother took a moment to respond and finally said “I’m not on drugs.”

He thought I’d bought them a Webkinz off of ebay! The little brats! lol!

Well, they’re in for more of a tease, because I have another package arriving in a few days. Muahahahaha! 3 years ago

After my little brother and sister helped babysit Gabe for when we went to the concert, I promised we’d buy them a new Webkinz as a reward.

So two brand new Webkinz have since been added to the downright scary horde brood; a springer spaniel and a lion fish.

The other day I went into their house to talk to my mom and I found her lying down, reading, on the lower bunk of my little brother’s bed in his room. I walk in, close the door behind me, start to talk, and break off in mid-word as my eyes were inescapably drawn upward to where row upon row of Webkinz toys were staring serenely at me.

“Wow,” I said. “That is creepy.“

My mom laughed and told me to look behind me.

I turn and jumped. Two shelves were lined shoulder to shoulder of these things.

At least they take good care of their toys. I overheard my little sister talking about how each pet has their own special reserved spot on the shelf (or clearly on the upper bunk bed.) She checks every night before bed to ensure they are all in their places.

The funny part is they have now returned to Neopets. 3 years ago

Virtual pets: 25

Physical toys: ...813 years ago

The obsessiveness has quieted down for the time being. Since the love puppy arrived, my little brother and sister have been pretty content. Oh, sure, there was a wistful mention of a cheeky dog (the brown one – buy it now price on ebay without tag: $750) but they both are aware they are never getting that!

When we went camping, my little brother and sister came too, sans Webkinz! At one point my little sister said to our brother “Good thing we didn’t bring any Webkinz!”

They’ve stopped bidding on things too – I didn’t have to stoop so low as to hack the account. 3 years ago

My mom emails me tonight to tell me that she only just discovered they are still bidding on love puppies! STILL BIDDING! After they already bought one. And this one was more expensive than the first.

This isn’t just insanity, it’s obsessive compulsive!

I am not buying another love puppy or any other toys off there! What is going on? Why is my dad letting them loose on ebay like that?!

I will be having a talk about this, not that my dad will listen/care. The only option I have is to change my little sister’s account information and switch the email out to my own so they can’t get back in. I feel terrible saying that. They will probably just make another account anyway.

Gaaaah! 3 years ago

It just doesn’t end.

The “Love Puppy” Webkinz has been the most recent pet my little sister has had her eye on been coveting.

The love puppy is a dog shaped toy with little hearts all over it’s body. Even I’ll (grudgingly) admit, it is cute. There is also a Love Monkey and a Love Frog, both of which were easily located at Value Village. Believe it or not, both the kids hated the Love Frog at first. “It’s so ugly! I could never love a love frog. I’d make him sleep all by himself and not with the other Webkinz on the shelf,” explained my little sister, backed up with “Yeah!” from our brother.

Until I started calling it “Francois” and talking with a french accent. “Bonjour! I am the Looooove Frog! Oui oui!”

Now they love their love frog, who is in fact, named Francois.

But their collection is (never) not complete without the elusive Love Puppy. And no wonder why – these things run into the $100’s or higher on ebay!

She spends her spare moments when NOT on Webkinz to search ebay high and low for an affordable toy. With or without the code, or even just the code, she doesn’t care. So long as it’s a love puppy.

So what do I get in my email today but a note from my dad that once again they were in cahoots together and they bought a love puppy for $30.00 (American, I might add) from ebay. She won the auction with $30.00 highest bid with only 3 minutes to go but shipping to Canada isn’t specified. So… could we ship it to Tommy’s mom’s house?

And… they need my credit card.

_{I love my family. I love my family. I love my family. I love my family. I love my family…}3 years ago

Perhaps you’ve heard of the Webkinz phenomenon affecting children aged 6-12? It’s like Beanie Babies and Neopets combined. Each plush pet comes with a birthdate and special information about it, as well as a code you enter on the website to create a virtual copy.

(It differs from Neopets in that you have to buy a toy before you can play and Webkinz only has ‘real’ creatures; no made up animals like shoyrus, grundos, ixis or zafaras.)

So this Webkinz thing… My little brother and sister are completely swept up by it. I don’t think even they know how any of the plush pets they have any longer. Last I checked it was in the 40’s. And that was a while ago.

Most of those they’ve gotten cheap at Value Village minus the code, but they still have many many brand new toys. It seems like every time we’d go somewhere, they’d be begging my mom for a new Webkinz. “Please, we’ve always wanted the blue whale!!”

Funny, that’s what you said about the husky I bought specially off ebay for you A WEEK AGO!

Actually, that’s not even correct. It was more like 5 days previously.

They wanted the husky Webkinz which was impossible to find in our area – believe we, we looked and looked and looked. Finally as a surprise, I bought it and a lioness off ebay for them. And then five days later we’re out shopping and my little brother is wailing he wants the blue whale and my little sister the blue google. (The google is a made up creature, the only on the Webkinz site from what I can see. It’s like a wingless duck.)

THEN the next day, we had some errands to run in town and this time they wanted the leopard gecko.

Shortly after that, my little brother asked me, that if he paid me back, would I buy him a german shepherd from ebay?

My little brother has speech problems; nothing major, but I’ve been working with him to fix the areas he has trouble with. I told him that as a reward once he was able to speak better, I’d be happy to buy him the german shepherd.

A few days later, I am informed that they have purchased a leopard gecko off of ebay with my dad’s help and that they told my dad I would pay for it!

No! What I said was that I would buy the german shepherd – oh you know what, forget it. I’ll buy the stupid thing but now you can’t have the german shepherd AND you can’t use the code on the gecko until you are talking better.

I’m not so disappointed in them as I really do just think that my little brother misunderstood me, but our dad surely should have known better than to let two little kids loose on ebay to bid willy nilly!

Webkinz are all my little sister talks about. She breathes and eats Webkinz world. Webkinz, Webkinz, Webkinz! They play with these things fanatically, too – they are all well loved and very well played with. Every trip to town, every time they are outside they each have one to play with. None of their collection have ever been mauled by one of the dogs, or gotten left outside. (They have a shelf just for the Webkinz.)

But sometimes I just feel like I’m going to go crazy if I have to hear one more thing about these toys! 3 years ago