I received an unexpected package today. Being a man of class, my initial plan was to save it for Christmas like the refined gentleman I am 
. One problem, the shipping label clearly showed the package was from @niece ! A vocal advocate for the barbarism of opening gifts before Christmas. Alas…I had no choice…
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A little context first. I am trying to collect every Butterfree card but to make things fun I only allow myself to purchase cards I find in person at a physical location. Knowing this is a near impossible task, I also allow myself to accept Butterfree cards as gifts from E4 members through events like these. Naturally, I steered my Secret Santa in that direction.
Buckle in! This ones a doosey!
First, I was greeted with a nice card with a kind (yet confusing) handwritten note. Potatoe Candy? Fox Chips? Needhams? Surely this is cabal lingo I haven’t learned yet..
As I dug into the box I found a bag of ‘Fox Chips’ (makes sense now) and 3 nicely wrapped gifts (I started opening one before I took this picture).
The first package contained some very tasty looking treats and things were starting to come together now. Unfamiliar with the exotic cuisine, I made myself a sampler platter to get the full Maine experience. Let me tell ya…it’s delicious! By far the best tasting packing material I’ve tried! There’s a bite left of the potato candy but the struggle is real right now.
Upon opening the second package I was struck with pure joy when I saw these Mr.Garrison/Butterfree themed packs 
. ‘oh jeez another repack’… the Butterfree nose hand and teeth… the Caterpie….the crimp….the attention to detail and creativity is just next level!
Under these packs I see a graded card turned upside down. Of course we must see what that is before we open the packs right?
A PSA9 1st ed Japanese Butterfree from Expedition! One of my all time favorites! The background artwork in the eReader era is the best of all time imo and I prefer many of the non-holos over the holo variants. I later learned this card is pop 18 in a PSA 9 
. How niece was able to acquire it is beyond me but I love it!
Onto pack 1…
It contained some absolutely beautiful cards! It wasn’t until later that I noticed Snubbull is looking up at a swarm of Butterfree! I also love the Meowth bsp art and of course everyone’s favorite chunky pika!
Pack 2 hit like a truck. Some beautiful modern full arts, a 1st ed Butterfree for my binder and a 1st ed Light Jolteon! Jolteon is one of my favorite Pokemon and Light Jolteon is one of my favorite artworks. Earlier this year I accidently purchased a damaged light Jolteon that was really…rough. A learning experience if you will. source Now I have a beautiful mint 1st ed copy to go with it 
Pack 3 was a Butterfree god pack! So many great cards to add to my binder. The Chinese copy is one of those cards that would be impossible for me to find in person. When I received the PSA9 Butterfree earlier in the unboxing process it was kind of bittersweet because it was too nice to crack out. Too my delight niece had all the bases covered and included a raw copy also!
All of these packs were meticulously opened so I can reseal them and sell them to some dumb noob save the artwork 
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Onto the final gift..aka the wtf moment
Anyone who’s been around here a while knows how talented niece is but I gotta tell ya…the art hits different in person. The Dandelion, the sun…I’ve been staring at this thing for an hour and I still don’t know what to say except I’m truly grateful to have another piece of E4 member artwork to add to my collection . I’m getting this framed.
I could go on forever
niece, thank you so much for your thoughtful, generous and creative gift. It made my year and will be cherished in my collection forever 
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Merry Christmas!
Edit: It’s come to my attention that I missed the custom code cards included in each one of my repacks . I’m reading them now and looking back through the gift with the additional context but wanted to update with a picture so it isn’t missed in the meantime.
