Taina Licciardo-Toivola has ten children, so she’s already some sort of superhero in my eyes.
She also feeds them all a vegan diet… suddenly me complaining about having to make my one child the odd cottage pie feels a bit unnecessary.
But these aren’t the reasons everyone’s talking about Taina and her family — she caused a big stir recently when she spent a whopping $5,000 on her 4-year-old daughter’s birthday.
Documenting her kids’ lives on her YouTube channel, Taine has more than 979,000 subscribers and her vidoes range from the latest smoothie challenge to her extra-large grocery hauls.
In one such video of her daughter Aphrodite’s extra-large birthday party, she dished out nearly $5,000 on three full playsets, two kitchens and a grocery store, as she explained: “I think it came to four-and-a-half thousand American dollars. But they can all play with it also” she said — meaning her other kids.
“We couldn’t decide what gifts to buy Aphrodite, so we just bought them all! She didn’t know what to do when she saw them.”
The price didn’t even include the price of Aphrodite’s actual party, which included a make-your-own pizza bar.
Of course, the internet being the internet, people had a thing or two to say.
“Why so much (and so much plastic) for just one kid?”
“This is way too much stuff for one child…”
“This is so gorgeous! I watched with a smile the whole time”
“The pure joy in her eyes made my day. These were such creative and thoughtful gifts.”
Money and gifts are such a relative thing, and with so many YouTube subscribers, it’s safe to say the family are probably pretty comfortable, despite the amount of kids. I wouldn’t expect to get a Barbie and a ball for my birthday if Elton John was my dad… But how much is too much?
Let us know your thoughts in the comments.
