Finally, we drove further north to go buy some toys for Linda's niece and nephew at The Learning Tree. I have to admit, I thought this would be pretty lame, but I was secretly hoping the store would blow me away. And away I was blown. Unique toys, classic toys, less licensed things, less toys that went beep beep boop boop. This place made the inner kid in me sing. Of course, I put that aside and went shopping for the actual kids.
Linda's niece and nephew, twins, lost everything to a house fire earlier this year. Even though their family had everything taken care of, we thought it'd be nice to just treat the kids. We got them a cool little fishing set that helps kids count. Linda also let her inner child loose and got some fancy rocks. While we were shopping, another family was also in the store. Four kids running around the store, their mother allowing them to just pick up something under $20. As she was checking out, she was telling Patti, the owner, about how her house burned down a couple of years ago, and how the kids lost all of their toys. Linda and I overheard, and I knew I wanted to help out.
Ya see, Western Avenue provides their Top Scouts with some money to do nice things for Western Ave patrons. I introduced myself to the mom, Summer, and proceeded to tell her how Linda's family was in a similar situation not too long ago. She immediately started crying, the hugs went around, and we ended up taking care of a portion of their purchase. I wish we could've done a bit more, but it was a cool thing none the less. I suck at taking praise, so all the credit goes to the Western Ave Association for giving me the opportunity to make some people smile.
