Santa Came to Town

Last Saturday Olivia and Aaron were invited, through Candlelighters (a children's cancer organization), to participate in "Shop with a Cop". In this case the North Las Vegas police department raised funds for patients and their siblings to go hog wild shopping at Kmart. We, 

 luckily Bill was with us, arrived at the store at 5:30 am on the 13th, signed in, ate donuts, got paired up with the kids assigned cops, watched a parade of police vehicles transporting Santa and the Mrs., and then went to have a chat with the big guy himself. After pictures were taken of each child and their cop with Santa, they chose a Christmas Bear in a shopping cart and away they went. Aaron was paired with a K9 officer who was a new dad himself, and Livi was put with a big teddy bear. He either carried Livi or held her hand the entire time. 

We originally didn't know how much each child was going to get to spend. Olivia had wanted a toy set that was $50. I told her officer and he said it wouldn't be a problem. I was curious, "How much exactly are they getting?" My jaw dropped. It went from how much do they get to spend to how much do they have to spend?! Neither of the kids had any problem being alone with their officers. Olivia and officer Memo had a slow start but once Livi realized she could get both the Bride Barbie and the Pony Barbie, they were on a role. (One little girl had 6 Barbies in her cart!) Aaron was giving officer 

 Paul a bit more of a challenge. He's quite the little thinker. Anything that Paul asked him if he'd like Aaron would hum and hah over it for such a long time. Then it was choosing which color. If you suggested th

at he get both he would push both away, say no, and you'd be right back at square one. He never really got into it as much as we thought he would. Towards the end of the 4 hour shopping spree he finally ran up to Elefun and said "my cart" (ca'k actually, for cart). It 

 will be interesting shopping with the kids after this. I wonder if they'll have withdrawls and want everything in sight. We got some great things. And I even was able to remember Aaron's new bunk beds and pick him up 2 sets of sport themed sheets. 

Our officers were the last to go through check out. As the kids and I, Bill had to leave a bit early, ate delicious boxed lunches, the cops took everything up front. They reported that we had actually gone over by about $20 each, I told them "I could've taken some stuff out." and they

 said, "The store had planned on it and had gift cards waiting on hand".

The amount of dedication these officers had for raising as much funds as they did is unbelievable. The kids were on cloud 9. As the carts went from 2 to 3 Bill and I were wondering if our new house would hold all the loot. We decided to quickly explain...we told the kids that Santa had come to see them this morning. "This year he was letting them do their own shopping because they had been so brave and strong with all the yucky hospital visits and doctor appointments and  medicine." 

The kids later agreed to not get into any of their things and that Mom and Dad would do a favor for Santa and wrap all his gifts for them. (Funny how Bill's getting out of that one when it was his idea!)

We all had a great time and especially enjoyed visiting with Leila's family, as they were also invited to join in on the fun.