The V-Day Box Fiasco

Out of desperation I yoked my husband with the task of helping #3 with her Valentine's Day box for school. I was battling an already busy week and #2 & #3 had been relentless in their quest to get their V-Day boxes done as soon as possible. I even offerred up the services of #1 to help him in this endeavor. The box design had already been established. It was to be a dog. Really, how hard can it be to make a dog out of a shoebox? I helped her gather the supplies and sent her to see her father. Then I settled in to help #2 with her much tougher desire to make a purse.

I should have taken the "Okay, but if it looks like a big brown turd, it's your fault!" much more seriously than I did.

I heard some scuttling coming from the kitchen, "No, we're not putting pom-pom's on your box." "Find me a picture of a dog on the internet." "How come you're not helping." "That is NOT helping." "There!" It had been half an hour (barely enough time for #2 and I to cut out the pattern for our V-Day box/purse) and he was finished. Satisfied with his work, he retired back to the comfort of his bedroom and remote control.

I worked diligently with #2 for another hour and then we decided to leave it for the night and work on it again tomorrow. I went to bed that night satisfied that I had finally been able to delegate some of my workload to my better half and it worked - I now only had to deal with one craft project. Wa-hoo!

The next morning I saw it! I wandered into the kitchen to get a bagel and I caught it out of the corner of my eye. Was that scotch tape I saw holding it together? Why is the head square? Was the tape not holding so you decided to staple the tail on? Seriously!?

Oh my goodness! What had I done? I had left the social well-being of #3 in the hands of someone who did not take crafting quite as seriously as I did. That was not what I had in mind when I delegated him this task. Now what was I going to do?

The consensus of those I discussed it with (and I discussed it with a LOT of people) was to see how #3 felt about the box. If she loved it, then I was going to have to live with it (I've gotten good at supressing things, but this may be asking too much). Of course, it would go to school bearing a "Made with love by Daddy" sticker on it. If she didn't love it so much, then I was going to have to carve out some time to help her "fix" it.

The next time I saw her she was toting it around asking me to help her glue the foam on her box as the tape Daddy put on wasn't sticking (really?). I was happy to oblige. I started asking her questions about other things she may want changed about her dog and the flood gates opened - Hallelujah! Without worrying about how I was going to break it to my husband (full well knowing I could NEVER ask him to do anything like this again), I stripped that poor dog back down to the box. I put the "skin" back on inside out and was getting ready to do the same to the face when I got caught.

#3 - "Mommy, you're putting the face on backwards! No one's going to be able to see the face that Daddy drew." (So close!).

Mommy - "Oh, you wanted to save that face?" was my only reply. "I was thinking we could do something a little different."

#3 - "But that's the face that Daddy drew."

Mommy - "Well, if you really want to keep the face that Daddy drew, we can keep it."

#2 - "That face looks like an old Chinese guy! You should let Mommy make it better." (Tonight, she was my favorite.)

#3 - "Okay, you can make it better." (Phew, that was close. I didn't know how I was going to make that pathetic dog face look any better on her new/improved box.)

After about an hour of foam cutting and design planning we were finished.

She seemed happy with the result.

And quite honestly, so was I. I'm not sure why I under estimate my ability to get it all done! So I have glue gun burns and blisters on two of my fingertips. In the end, it's the price I'm willing to pay for a presentable V-Day box!

After all was said and done, Dad was thankful that I fixed the dog. He confessed that he felt bad about the product #3 was going to take to school. He loved the new dog too (even if he doesn't love the real dog!).

P.S. #2's box did not suffer from the extra time it took me to do #3's box. So, I missed the Bachelor hometown dates - that's why God invented internet TV!