Your socks are ringing!

We got the boy good this year.

He has been begging for a cell phone for years. All his friends have them. Many of the girl's freaking friends even have them! I don't really understand people buying cell phones for eight-year-olds. Blackberrys and touch screens, even! It's all about the status and nothing about necessity.

/rant

Anyway. So the boy wants a cell phone, but we have been telling both children for years and years and YEARS that they cannot have one until their b'nai mitzvah. That's when they are 13. That was the deal. The kids knew it - it was loud and clear. That didn't stop them from occasionally giving us a jab or a whine or a guilt trip about it. "Wouldn't it be nice if I could just call you?" Yeah, I'd say. When you are THIRTEEN.

We decided to back down on the thirteen thing. The boy is eleven and a half, and we have started leaving him home alone occasionally. There have been instances when we wished he had his own phone. So sometime in November, I bought him a Samsung something-or-other. With camera, GPS, and no texting. Just the right package for an 11-year-old. Of course, I got myself a swanky new Motorola Krave which I love, but that's a different story. I put the phone away in a closet until Chanukah time. The boy saw my new Krave and gave me a zing: "Is that for me?!?!" Uh, no. Sorry, kid.

I prepped the girl. I figured if the boy got a phone for Chanukah and she wasn't prepared, she'd be PISSED. So one day, she was giving her normal whine. "My friends all have cell phones, do I HAVE to wait until I'm 13? Can I have one at 12?" This time I said, "How about eleven-and-a-half?" She was shocked. Speechless, even. She excitedly said, "REALLY?" So I responded, "Well, yes, but you know what that means, right?" She immediately responded, "The boy is getting a cell phone now?" She's a smart one, that girl. But she was prepared and not jealous at all, knowing she has only three years until her phone instead of five.

Our family has a tradition when opening Chanukah presents. We always give eight presents, all laid out on the fireplace on the first day, and they can choose which of them to open each night. One of the presents is ALWAYS bags of socks, and another present is ALWAYS underwear. That's just a thing - my parents did it to me too, so the tradition carries forward.

The boy has his own tradition... he feels out the presents for the SOCKS, and opens them the first night. The second night, he feels out the underwear. "I just want to get it over with," he says. He wants to save the "big" present for last. The girl, on the other hand, will go for the big present first so she can enjoy it.

A week before Chanukah, I took the phone out of the box. I turned it on. I stuck the phone in one of the rolled-up SOCKS. I wrapped the package of socks. I wrapped the rest of the box that formerly contained the phone. I put both in the pile of gifts by the fireplace, ready for Chanukah. I figured the boy would choose the socks, open them, say "Great, I got the socks." Then I would call the phone and let those socks ring.

Awesome, right?

Well, a few days before Chanukah, the pile of gifts began to ring. Wrong number, or someone who used to have that number, or something. OMG, I grabbed those wrapped socks and ran. Thankfully the boy did not hear it.

I turned off the phone, put it back in the socks, and put the package back in the pile. I had to be more stealth about this.

The first night of Chanukah this year was spent at my BIL and SIL's house. They live hours away in Massachusetts, but I decided to schlep up all eight of the presents for each of the kids along with all of the in-law gifts.

It was time to give the kids their presents. I secretly grabbed the socks and opened the small hole in the wrapping paper that I had left. I turned on the phone and put it back. I then presented the kids with the bags full of their own gifts, and asked them to each pick one.

The girl, as expected, picked what would be the best of her choices from how it looked wrapped. And the boy? Yep, he felt all of the packages, shook them all, weeded out the underwear and socks, weighed them against each other in each of his hands, and chose... the socks. Yeah! How predictable are my kids!! I was so excited.

He unwraps the socks and yells "YEAH!! I GOT SOCKS!!! AWESOME!!"

Ring.

Confusion on his face. He looks at me thinking it's my Krave ringing, since I'm holding it.

Ring.

He looks at me again. Out of the socks falls the phone on the floor.

Ring.

DUDE, I wish I wasn't calling him at that second so I could get a pic of his face. I should have had someone else set up with a camera.

Ring.

He grabs the phone from the floor and answers it. "Whose phone is this?" he says.

I say: "Took you long enough for you to answer your phone!"

Priceless.