I could have saved a small fortune if I had known, but I had no idea. I thought that in order to obtain toys, you had to spend money or find someone to give them to you. Nope. Not true. All you have to do if you want some toys is to send a few off to a storage shed. Once that door closes and the mice and bugs start to invade, those toys get . . . ahem . . . "busy." They multiply. They breed. They make like the Duggars and procreate.

There is no other explanation.

When we lived in the tiny little townhouse, it was a constant struggle to keep the pile of plastic toy factory puke under control (sorry, but that's exactly what it looked like in our living room--like a toy factory had puked all over it). I was constantly rotating things out, boxing things up, and sending toys that I deemed "done" off to storage. I often thought about giving lots of toys away, but we held on to the hope that we would be moving soon and would have enough space for them all.

We did. We do. Alexis has a giant playroom complete with a walk-in closet.

(Aside: the playroom wound up in the living room that is off our family room. That would be the room with its own bathroom. It was selected because My Two Army Brats commented that her boys would throw toys off the side of the loft. In an instant, I knew Alexis would, too. I don't really feel the need to have my head smashed by a flying Dora doll, thankyouverymuch.)

It wasn't until I started unpacking all of the boxes from storage that I realized the depths of depravity we have inflicted on our kid. Toys. Toys. Toys. Miles and miles of toys. There are four large plastic tubs of stuffed animals. There are two full tubs of dolls. A shelf is dedicated to boxes and boxes of board games. It's nothing short of a miracle that the kid doesn't spend her every waking minute bawling her eyes out about how we clearly don't love her and she has absolutely nothing to do.

I'm quite certain that daycare would believe her story, if she were to tell it.

Every Wednesday is Show-n-Tell. Every Wednesday I send Alexis into her playroom to pick out something to take with her. Every Wednesday she walks straight to the little bin that holds Happy Meal toys and picks one out.

Despite a room full of toys that didn't come free with some french fries, the kid takes a Happy Meal toy to school every. single. Wednesday.

I wish I had known that all a kid needs is a few Happy Meal toys before I sent all those things off to storage to procreate.