Tuesday, July 13, 2010

Cars: The Search for Red (and Mack, and Frank, and Flo...)

Sadie's tractor obsession has competition: Cars. The Pixar movie has become a central part of Sadie's day. She got a box full of Cars books for her birthday and she carries them around and "reads" them to herself out loud.

She also got a "Cars" car carrying case for her birthday, with a number of Cars characters inside of it because she was spending so much time playing with the handful of cars that she already had.

And as I've browsed the Cars section of all the local stores that sell Cars toys (when we go to The City) I have to say I'm beginning to suspect a sales strategy that is more than a little annoying. It's easy enough to find a Lightening car. But most of the other main characters are in high demand.

It took us three months to find a plain old "Mater." And we happened upon "Sally" before her birthday by pure chance (Paul had looked for it online and we'd almost given up when we saw it for over $30... we were thrilled when we finally found one at Target for $3.50). Now that we have plain Mater (along with new Mater, bathtub Mater, Burger King Mater, Fire Truck Mater, and stuffed Mater, which Maggie gave her in the hospital... because everyone in the family was on the lookout for Mater's and so Sadie kept receiving them as gifts!)

Now Sadie's obsession has shifted. She's so fickle.

She's now in love with Red. Of course I have never seen a Red in person before, but I'll keep my eyes peeled. If we haven't found one by Christmas (and her attention is still focused on Red, which it might well be... she brings over her Cars books and shows me his picture a dozen times a day...) I might have to break down and order one from Amazon as her "big" present. Imagine that... a little match box size cast iron car is in such high demand it becomes the "main" present. Hopefully though, we'll find one for the regular $3.50 price at either Target or Walmart. The search is on.

The other two cars that she's also in love with are Frank (the combine harvester) and Mack.

Paul has pointed out that the sales strategy works, because we feel downright victorious each time we actually find one of Sadie's favorites. And it keeps us going back to the Cars section of the store, searching through every single little package to see if they have one of Sadie's favorites...

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