Perfect Fit

Some people may not know that my husband's a collector. Yes, it's true. There's his hockey puck collection, for one. Or his kite collection. Or his Whitewing airplane collection. The latest is his golf ball collection.

But before all of those, years ago, there was only one - his bouncy ball collection. We have bouncy balls that are big, balls that are small. We have sparkly ones, shiny ones, and balls that light up. We have Superman, Sponge Bob, Santa Claus, you name it. I don't know how many we have - probably 300, give or take a few (probably take a few, since Kyle's been known to play with the collection).

Once upon a time, we were looking for a place to store these bouncy balls. There didn't seem to be a container that was "meant to be." Until one summer afternoon.

My family was making the two-day drive up from Texas to visit. And in my family, road trips mean only two things: lots of books-on-tape and lots of FOOD. Upon pulling into the driveway, my dad got out of the car with a grin and said, "I have something for Kevin." He then proceeded to pull out a gigantic empty Utz Cheese Balls container.

There was a moment of confusion as we looked at each other and thought, "An empty bucket. Gee, thanks Dad."

But then we were enlightened. "It's for your bouncy balls," he explained. And sure enough, as soon we dumped those hundreds of bouncy balls in, we knew we'd found a perfect fit.

Since then, we've come to appreciate the gigantic Utz Cheese Ball barrel as a means of storage. It's perfect for those McDonald's toys and other random "treasures" that Kyle insists on keeping. Plus, you get the added bonus (in Kevin's opinion, not mine) of eating 35 ounces of grease and cheese powder.

What more could you want?