Where else can you find a toy that went out of manufacture three years ago, that your autistic child so desperately wants?!
I must put my hand up and admit I was once a high volume seller on there and built a big online business purely from selling on the site. I still have the account, but sadly I have no time these days to spend listing, dealing with customers and their (sometimes odd, sometimes down right rude) messages, the Post Office queues (yes it was probably me who held you up in the queue one day, sending my 101 parcels I had sold over the weekend!), and the rip off (in my opinion) that is the seller listing fees,the seller selling fees, the PayPal fees and the expectation that I should gold leaf wrap each parcel and hand deliver to certain customers within the hour of them pressing 'Buy it Now'. Can you tell my few years of doing this that I got a little jaded by it?!
But I am digressing.
J develops passions for various characters from TV.
Most of these however are from a few years ago -
*Bear in the Big Blue House
*Fimbles
*Story Makers
*Higgledy House
*Balamory
*Teletubbies
Apart from Teletubbies and Fimbles, the others are not readily available to buy from the highstreet anymore. But why should I pay the vastly inflated highstreet prices for these goods when I can get them in near perfect condition, second hand and at a fraction of the price from eBay?
So I trawl through eBay for second (or third or fourth) hand items that are related to his passions.
DVDs, cuddly toys (preferably that make noises) and books (hardback to avoid him ripping the pages) are all gratefully bidded on.
His bedroom is awash with all things Fimbles at the moment.
He is just mad on it.
And because it is'nt actually costing me a fortune he has rather a lot of the stuff!
I just imagine in the future, when he is a grown man, that he will still have all these child orientated items and love them just as much as he does now. And why should'nt he? He is so happy when surrounded by them, I want him to be a happy adult too - even when he still has a Tinky Winky propped up on his pillow!
