Out with the old...

On the day we made Holden's adoption official in court, we gifted him the original looking sock monkey. Now there are about 1 billion varieties of the sock monkey. His was the brown and white with red hair.  I remember Holden's pudgy 6 month old face looking at the crazy creature after he had pulled it out of the gift bag. He almost looked scared of it. But oh man, he quickly grew to love that thing. He loved it to pieces . . . quite literally.  I think when we took his paci away, he began to suck on it's face during his sleep time. Gross, I know.  I had to frequently wash it because it had a nasty, dried, slobbery smell on it and it's face began to discolor, regardless of my washing.  Nana repaired the sock monkey once.

And then they gave him a new spunky, colorful sock monkey last Christmas. He was over the moon when he opened it up. But it never took the place of his original. Which I found sort of sweet, given the meaning behind this special gift. 

Well, Holden received a little cash for his birthday this year. We talked and he wanted a new brown sock money, which he promised to take very good care of. (He's a picker. So when the old one would develop a little wear and tear, he would just pick and pick and pick at it. Making it look terrible.) We headed to Target today to buy just that. We went up and down each toy aisle twice and I couldn't find sock monkeys anywhere. I was beginning to think I was going to have to order one online, when I finally spotted one monkey left on the clearance aisle. It was the original brown, white and red like he had wanted. And it was marked down quite a bit! :) How did we get so lucky! As soon as I handed it to Holden, he and the new monkey went cheek to cheek. He often drifts off to sleep with his monkey shoved under his face, like an extra pillow. So we often see him take his little sock monkey and pull it up to his cheek. :) So that move was fitting.

So now as I type this, old sock monkey is downstairs in the living room, maybe forgotten about for now. Not sure how I feel about that. :) And Holden is snuggling with his newer version.

He has always called his sock monkey, "monkey". That was his name, I guess. I asked him if he wanted to give his new sock money a name. He told me it would be "Good Monkey". Ha. So creative, right? ;)