Bad Easter Bunny!

This Easter Pete and I decided the "Easter Bunny" would bring bikes for the girls. The girls have used their current bikes for the past two summers and it was time for new bikes. Their old bikes were still in good shape, however, the girls have really out grown them.

One weekend about 2 months ago, we took the girls to Toys R Us and just let them explore the bike area. They both really like the same bike, so later that week Pete went and purchased the bike...my first mistake! Normally, this is a task I would do, however, it is hard for me to leave the girls, so he stopped after worked. When he got home, I asked if he took them to his parents house and he was like "No, they are in the garage". Naturally, I assumed we had two shiny purple bikes in the garage and the surprise would surely be blown the minute the girls looked outside. He assured me they wouldn't see the bikes, as he covered them with a blanket. I didn't quite understand how he could manage this, so I checked it out myself. To my surprise and dismay, he didn't have either bike assembled. They were both still in the boxes. AHHHH!!

For anyone who knows Pete, you will know why this is a problem. Poor Pete is the least handy person I have ever met. I am more handy and that isn't saying much. When I asked why on God's Green Earth didn't he have them assembled, he was shocked! He couldn't believe I would doubt his ability to assemble two children's bikes. He was like "It was $50 to have these things assembled. I'm not paying that, when we could do it for free! Geese Kathleen, all you do is throw money away! THIS is why never have any money!" OK, so buying two bikes turned into a lecture on my spending habits. Actually, it was his defense system covering for the fact that neglected to ask Toys R US the details on assembling the bikes...see how he is!

Fast forward two months and the time is around 9pm the evening before Easter. I say to Pete "hey, what about the bikes? Are you going to put them together for tomorrow?" He looked at me and was like "Yah, how hard could it be? We'll whip these out before 10pm." WRONG!!!!
After about 30, maybe 40 minutes Pete says "hey, do you think we could bring these back for Toys R Us to assemble? This is really hard!" I looked at the pieces and I felt so sad for my husband. It was like 5 pieces he had to put together to create this bike, yet he could not. I started to help, as if I was Handy Mandy coming to save the day. I tinkered about 15 minutes and was like, "Geese, this is hard! How are we going to do this?" I swear the directions were so hard to understand and the bulk of the directions were on how to install the reflectors, which we couldn't even find in the box. We didn't have any of the tools required to assemble this bike, so things kept falling off after we put them on. All we could do was laugh and I think we both wanted to cry a little too!

Two hours of so passed and this bike is still in pieces on our living room floor and we are both getting tired. We couldn't figure this out and it was getting late, so we decided we would give the girls 1 bike and tell them the Easter Bunny was tired and asked if we could put the other bike together. It sounded good at 11pm, however, at 7am the girls were like "WTF?"

I had this great idea the day before to color two "special" eggs for the girls and when if they found it, they would get a special surprise...the bikes. They both went to bed excited about the idea and just as excited when they got up. The first thing they did was search for these 2 eggs, bypassing every other object in their way. They passed up candy, money and a pluther of plastic eggs. When they both found the eggs, it was like Christmas morning! All they wanted was the "surprise" from the Easter Bunny. So, we had them sit on the floor and Pete went and got the "bike"...their faces...priceless!! He wheeled out this poor excuse for a bike and they were like, "this is our surprise? One bike?" Their first question was "do we have to share it" and we we were like "No, the Easter Bunny left another, but, asked if we could put it together." They looked at each other, knowing the would never see that other bike assembled before the end of the summer. Then they were like "can we ride it?" We were like "well, you can sit on it, but, the wheel isn't attached to the front, so it might fall off if you try to peddle." Our poor kids! They both went from being so excited to so disgusted by us, as if they knew we were the reason this bike was in such a state. They both got on the bike and forced a smile and then "thanks, let us know when we can ride it!" They went back to their baskets and then we heard Gabriella say to Emily " I thought the surprise was going to be better" , Emily responded with "it would have been better, if they put the bike together! I guess we're stuck with our smaller bikes for a little longer!"

Pete and I felt horrible, here we wanted to have a really cool surprise and we blew it! Pete kept saying "it was only $50 to have it assembled, why didn't I do it?" It's not the first thing, our kids have many toys that stayed in boxes for years or things assembled wrong. Poor Pete even put the Light Brite together wrong! I think it's time we both take a class at the Home Depot or hire a full time handy man.