Now that Thanksgiving has come and gone, a lot of us are counting down the shopping days until Christmas. D-Day for me used to be the last day I could select standard shipping online and still get my stuff by Christmas Eve, but now that so many Websites have gotten wise to this and offer upgraded shipping until December 22^nd or 23^rd, there’s really not much downside to waiting until the last minute …

OH, WAIT … now that I have a kid, there IS!

Why, you ask? After all, Amazon has an incredible toy department, and they can sometimes deliver the SAME day (which still kind of seems like magic to me).  But even with the Amazon drone-sponsored drop shipments, there will always be a Christmas that will have that ONE toy that every kid will go absolutely crazy for, and supply will NOT keep up with demand.  You will have to plan ahead and decide if you’re going to get the toy or instead create some cover story for why Santa Claus, who allegedly can fulfill every nice kid’s wish, was not able to deliver this time (which, by the way, is a perfectly legitimate move … I think it’s helpful for kids to learn that good things come to those who wait).

This year, that toy is the Hatchimal. Hatchimals are these super-cute stuffed animals that are combinations of birds and other animals (e.g., owlicorn or bearakeet).  They come in oversized eggs that hatch after a kid plays with them enough.  Once they hatch, a kid can interact with the stuffed animal to take it through three stages of development (for you children of the 1990s, they’re Tamagotchis on steroids):

Hatchimals are now going for 5x MSRP on Amazon. I don’t have to work for an investment manager to figure out that’s a pretty good return.

This Hatchimal craze made me think back to other Christmas toy crazes. The craziest toy craze I remember is the Cabbage Patch Kid Craze of 1983.  Back when there was a Sears catalog, I used to flip through it and circle what I wanted for Christmas, and I remember circling that doll without fully understanding that people were actually fighting each other for them when stores got new stock (the dolls subsequently crashed and burned under various owners, but when they were under Coleco, they were HUGE).  Luckily, my dad just happened to come across a new shipment when he stopped by a Walgreen’s in Downtown Houston during work.  Otherwise, I wouldn’t have gotten one since back then there weren’t the online scalping markets we have now.

A doll that didn’t inspire quite the same craze as the Cabbage Patch Kid but reminded me of the outfit above was Rainbow Brite. She was whimsical with these awesome color-blocked shoes and dress:

I think this Salvatore Ferragamo outfit that I got from Moda Operandi (www.modaoperandi.com) and Farfetch (www.farfetch.com) captures that same whimsy.  The skirt has color-blocked panels with zig-zag trim, and the turtle-neck sweater has oversized buttons that do a great job of tying the black, white and magenta panels together.  And I added a color-blocked Pierre Hardy handbag that I got from Gilt (www.gilt.com) to stay with the theme.

I think it’s a super-fun outfit and totally puts me in the mood for toy buying … even if I have to scour everywhere for the Nintendo or Transformers or Furby of the moment.