Let’s talk about character licensing for a moment.

Up front I will admit to being a hypocrite. I’m ok with super heroes… spidey and batman are on my son’s underpants. He has (granted, they are hand-me-down) spiderman shirts. I think he even has an Incredibles t-shirt. And we are fairly inundated with Winnie the Poo… although I try to cull most of it to the give-away box… but I’m still in love some of that classic poo baby stuff…. Sorry, but you can’t go dissin’ AA Milne just because some crook is pimping him.

So before I go further, in the interest of full disclosure, I will take an inventory…. We have a few hand-me-down Sesame Street toys and a Diego DVD and some Bob the Builder stuff. Several pieces of the “Cars” collection and some spiderman junk. We have a “my first book of princesses” Disney board book that I am forced to pull out and display prominently whenever the, ehem, gift giver is in town. We have a wooden Thomas set, DVD & Big Loader. And we have I-don’t-know-how-many McDonald’s toys that are licensed character themes…. “Engine” turtles, Flushed Away & something with penguins come to mind immediately.

Here’s a crazy thought… what if we got rid of all the plastic, battery-operated toys and only had classic, wooden toys? I’ve heard of people who do this. Oh wait, we tried that…. Remember the Thomas lead-paint recall? Yup, I had a “classics only” mommy moment and insisted if Nana was getting him Thomas for Christmas I wanted the wooden set….4 of the 6 pieces we have got mailed away… sigh.

So I was patting my self on the back… we have very little Sesame Street, no Sponge Bob, a Dora hand-me-down potty seat (yes, hand-me-down potty seat....), Diego on DVD only…. And then I see THIS….

Oh LORD, I forgot about the Elmo Guitar. Somebody hand-me-downed this to us…. Oh what a dreadful toy…. And now I have to feel guilty about whoever bought it from the thrift store. (Further reading leads me to believe it is ok because it was made before May 2007… whatever… I’m still responsible for destroying the sanity of some poor parent by exposing them to the horror that is Elmo-on-reverb guitar.)