My daughter didn't need to "have" anything for school until this year, second grade. I don't mean school supplies, I mean there wasn't a hot item all the rage on the playground until this year. At the start of the year, it was Pokemon cards. The Pokemon phase happened to coincide with her birthday and no surprise, she received a ton of cards as gifts and a binder that she lugged to school every morning. That was until Christmas, when the next thing came along. Now - between two kids - we have a hundred little Gogo's Crazy Bones around the house. I find them in the laundry, in a drawer along side the tooth paste...basically I find them everywhere around the house, either because we have too many or because they are breeding.
Between holiday gifts and some of my daughter's money, we have a lot of these little things. I don't buy my kids toys just for the sake of getting toys, but still we've ended up with a lot of whatever toy my daughter and her class mates have pegged as the "It" item. So why do I feel like such a chump for buying them?
The "It" items frequently end up being the shared markers of a generation's childhood. Many people my age collected Star Wars figures, Scratch n Sniff stickers, and Smurf figurines, all items that feature prominently in my elementary school memories. (Gogo's mean something different to those my age and the name sometimes puts the songs We Got the Beat or Vacation into my head.) I justified buying Pokemon cards because those will likely be handed down to my son. Pokemon cards seem to always be popular making it likely my son will go through a Pokemon phase too. For example, when I bought a generic card display binder for my daughter, the 19-year-old cashier reminisced that he used to own the same binder as a kid to hold his Pokemon cards. Gogo's are cute, but I certainly don't need over a hundred of them around the house once this trend blows through.
The hardest part of a playground fad from the parent perspective is dealing with the Joneses. Some kids have parents that are more indulgent and some kids have parents ordering rare pieces off eBay, both are fine, except when it comes to the repeat questions from your kid about why you're not going to follow suit. In one way, it's a good life lesson, I just wish it didn't include whining.
I've managed to steer my kids clear of the stores carrying Gogo's, but anytime we go out, my daughter will take some of her money "just in case" she sees a five pack of Gogo's. Recently I had to assure her that the nursery, where we were headed to buy plants and soil, did not carry Gogo's. I had to offer to lend her the money in case it turned out they did.
When she does get a new pack, she does the closest thing to praying that I've seen from her as she tears open the wrapping. "Please let there be a five or 15, please be a five or 15, five or 15, five or 15..." (In a slick move, the manufacturer made some of the Gogo's in limited quantities, producing a top five and a top 15 most wanted.) For a moment it was all worth it when she opened a bag and found a highly coveted (by her friends) top 15 Gogo. The scene was more emotional than when Charlie found the golden ticket. She froze, her breath quivered, she closed her eyes, paused, and then jumped to her feet shouting. When she ran over to me, she had water in her eyes. She must have kicked up some dust as she ran over, because I got some water in my eyes too. I wasn't crying over a Gogo! Silly.
I think I'll hold onto the Gogo's after they've been abandoned by my kids. I cringe when I think of all of the Star Wars toys my parents discarded when I was finished with them. Who knows, maybe 25 years from now I'll be able to cash in on at least one fad.