American Girl Disappointment

I'm so disgusted with myself!

A few weeks ago, I hopped on over to americangirl.com to look at some possible gifts for my niece Ashley for Christmas. Last year I bought her the Kirsten doll and book because her mother told me that she had checked out a book from the library the previous year about Sweden and was now completely obsessed with it. She would always talk of visiting Sweden and eating Swedish food and getting more books on Sweden. Well, I had the idea of getting her an American Girl anyway, and when I saw that they had a girl from Sweden, I was just over the moon and so excited to get it for her!

She loved her Kirsten doll too. She read the first book in 2 days (she was in 2nd grade) and couldn't wait to get more. So her faithful Aunt G (that's what they call me) scoured the used book store for all the books in the set. When I would find one, I would mail it to her, or when I would get a catalog in the mail, I would forward it on to my niece. It became our little "thing" and it was special to me.

When she found out that they were discontinuing Kirsten this year she immediately called her Aunt G (which was very unusual, so that told me that she was very concerned). She didn't understand why. But I explained that Kirsten had been with American Girl for a very long time and that it was just time for them to make room for other dolls and stories and that she was so lucky to have gotten Kirsten when she did.

So, back to the reason for this post. I checked a few weeks ago for Kirsten accessories because I wanted to get my niece the birthday outfit from the books. Nothing was sold out and it seemed like there was plenty of everything, so I decided to wait and order closer to Christmas. Boy was I ever wrong! I just checked yesterday and everything was completely sold out...EVERYTHING! Everything down to a set of socks and a little pair of boots! Even the overpriced doll furniture was sold out. I was just sick. The only thing you could order were her accessories, but they are on back order until June! I even looked on ebay but didn't see much. And what I did see was double or triple the original price.

All this to say that I guess I've learned my lesson about purchasing items that are going to be discontinued. You should snatch them up when you first get the notion to do so because if you wait too long, it may be too late! But I'm still very aggravated. I mean, they run out of stuff right before Christmas? Why didn't they try to manufacture enough to meet the demand that they knew would be coming at Christmas time? It just irks me!

So now I don't know what to get my niece. I really wanted to have that special "thing" with the American Girl doll. It really meant a lot to me last Christmas. But I was thinking of looking up a Swedish cookie recipe or something and making it with her. That could be fun.

But I'm just kind of disappointed.

Aunt G and Ashley.
Everyone says we kind of look alike.
And this was just like, 3 Christmases ago...why do I look so much younger? Ah yes...pre-baby.