What part of 250 balls sounded like a good idea?

Santa brought Ethan a Fisher Price inflatable school bus ball pit for Christmas. It seemed like a good idea at the time, and Ethan sure enjoys himself, but my poor back is NOT thanking Santa Claus for it.

I should have stuck with the bag of 25 balls that the bus came with. But when my eyes caught a glimpse of the large bag of brightly colored balls on the shelves at Toys R Us, I was like a kid in a...well...toy store. I immediately threw it in my cart.

I mean, come on, 25 balls in a ball pit? Not much fun. 250? Now that's fun.

So as you can imagine, cleaning up at the end of the night is a tiresome bend-down-pick-up routine. We try to get Ethan to help, but it just makes him more interested in continuing to play so we end up doing most of it once he goes to bed.

I have a feeling that one of these days the school bus is going to get lost on it's way to Ethan's house and will never be seen again ;)