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At long last, your Holiday shopping is complete! Every last person is checked off the list, and you have time to spare. Maybe you deserve something a little extra special, too? Or is there someone you suddenly remembered? Are you just imagining that you’re done? What if you actually haven’t gotten everything finished? This time of year is always so stressful—how are you handling shopping at all?
Kayla was always fastidious when it came to shopping of any sort. All coupons were to be clipped, all budgets were to be respected, and every list was to be checked at least three times. Holiday shopping was no exception; indeed, it needed a special level of care due to the amount of people involved and the potential to go way over budget. Still, she had a feeling that she was well set up for this year's holiday shopping, and so she marched into the various stores (figuratively, in the case of the online ones) to get her shopping done.
Actually, it wasn't as gargantuan a task as she was making it out to be. Her mother had made a very simple request: a new cardigan to replace the one that was starting to seriously wear out. The only other person on the list, really, was Luca, and she hadn't even asked for anything directly. Luca was just getting a gift as a matter of principle. It kind of worried Kayla that her gift list was so small. She needed more friends, apparently. Well, it saved money, which was a small comfort, she guessed.
The new cardigan was a fairly simple purchase; Mara Lee preferred neutral colors so she could match things well with other items in her wardrobe. A pleasant light grey with a black border served the cardigan well. Luca was going to get cute round chicken earrings; they seemed to suit her style, and they were more than just eggs. Surely, Luca would appreciate the eggs too, but the chickens were cuter.
Speaking of eggs, there was one more goodie for Luca. She was getting Hatchimals. Why Hatchimals? It should have been obvious, but in case it wasn’t: eggs. Eggs that you warm up and then hatch. What could be better for Destiny City’s resident egg aficionado? Kayla was sure that her phone would blow up with frenzied excited texts when her friend got to her other gift.
Though the list was brief, Kayla found herself staring it down. She really hoped she wasn’t forgetting anyone or anything, even though it was highly unlikely. It just felt like something, somewhere, was missing.
Herself, maybe?
Kayla had not gotten herself anything in a good while. But what was there that she really wanted? She must have searched her mind for ages and come up with nothing. Not even window shopping seemed to help her get an idea of what she wanted herself. At some point, she wandered off and chatted online with a faraway friend. The conversation somehow arrived at the topic of craft hobbies, and the friend mentioned garage kits: putting together and painting sculptures of various characters.
Now, Kayla didn’t watch that much anime (hence her struggles with Itsuki’s Japanese earlier), but she was always good with putting things together, especially if there were fiddly details that had to be minded. Her friend mentioned that not knowing anything about the characters might actually be a good starting place, as she would paint them without any expectations, or something like that. In fact, she could even paint them to look like original characters! Not that she really had any, but it was a cool idea.
The more Kayla thought about it, the more she found herself liking the idea. It would take a bit of saving up to get the paint and whatnot, but this seemed like something promising to do in her downtime. This was going to be new and different for her, constructing instead of destroying. It was a nod to her senshi sphere, and that was nice.
Smiling to herself, Kayla pulled up the garage kit shopping site and began browsing for interesting characters.
