Black Friday Shopping

Black Friday Shopping...Do you do it? I do. And I love it. I am a die hard. I get up and stand in line for the stores that open at four and five am. I usually peruse the fliers the day before for at least a few hours and I map out my route in order to maximize my shopping experience.

I am usually out and home by 8am,  before most people are even awake. I have lists. And my route usually looks something like a professional football play book. Cut right. Swing left. Run straight through the middle. Rush the doorman. I am a courteous shopper, I would never trample anyone or hit them with my cart to get them out of the way. I have been known however to scoop the last of an item without looking back to see if I am leaving someone in tears. I won't snatch it out of their hands but I will power walk to beat someone to something if it appears we are looking at the same item.

I'm pretty proud of my shopping abilities. It is complete instinct to locate the very best deals and it is skill to be able to pull off buying them. Last year I was at the outlet mall at 3:30am, got what I needed and headed off to Toys R Us. Yikes, there was a kink in my plan last year, I underestimated the million other parents trying to scoop the best deals for their kids. I scrapped the Toys play and moved on to the Target play. Got everything I needed there. Hit Joann. Got the last of the shatterproof ornaments that were doorbusters. Stopped at Walmart and was home by 8:15 with a trunk full of goodies. But that was last year.

This year? This year I was feeding Sam at 12:45am. Then I was wrestling her to go back to sleep until 2am. I have another blocked milk duct so needless to say I was really in no condition to be up and moving before the sun was up. I slept in. I SLEPT IN. On Black Friday. How do I tell my kids there will be no Christmas?

Ok, so I did finally get out the door and go shopping and I am pretty proud of my revised game plan. I went to Toys R Us and was mildly surprised when I walked in the door- there were only a few people in each line and you could still walk through the aisles. That was, until I noticed a few people that seemed to be milling about in the outer aisle. And then I realized that WAS the line. All the way around the outer edge of the store. Yikes! Doorbusters ended at 1pm everywhere and it was already 10:15- I was afraid I was only going to get one store under my belt and have to call it quits.

Turns out the one item I wanted was kind of a special item anyway- it is a playhouse with slide. I had to wait for customer service to even look up if they had any in stock. She located one and then kindly allowed me to pay for it right there instead of sending me off with a ticket to stand in line. Score!! I was in and out of Toys in like 30 minutes. Moving on.

I hit Kohls next because their doorbusters also ended at 1pm. I really wanted this Cuisinart knife set that was on sale for like half price plus then had a gigantic rebate. I walked in and again only saw a few people in each line. You would think I would know by then that the lines wrapped around the exterior of the store- but I didn't find that out until I had my arms semi loaded. I debated dropping it all and heading out the door but that knife set was just calling my name. After all, I did have to hunt for it. You know, when someone takes something and drops it off in some other place in the store because they decide they can't wait in a two hour line? Yeah. I found where that person dropped it and I was ecstatic.

I can't take credit for this but I did hear another lady telling her friend that she was going to buy some jewelry so she could check out at the jewelry counter. AHA! I will definitely be using that trick again. I headed up to the jewelry counter and picked out a pair of tiny diamond chip earrings for Hayley. Regular price $125, sale price $28. Time saved in line? Priceless. But the real reason I was so excited about Kohls was that I purchased all of the following for $85 (after mail in rebates and Kohls cash): Diamond stud earrings for Hayley to wear when her ears do get pierced, a 15 piece Cuisinart knife set, four bath towels, a pair of Skechers, a pair of Christmas socks, and a board game. All of that for eighty five dollhairs. Awesome huh? And with the jewelry counter score I was in and out of Kohls in forty minutes. SWEET!! I would have saved an additional $30 if I had been inclined to open a K chargecard but I opted not to because you actually had to fill out the application. If they could have just typed it in from my photo ID I might have done it.

I stopped quickly at Walmart because they had a $4 (yes, four dollar) hand mixer. Unfortunately I was out of luck on that. They had a whole pallet of the other four dollar appliances but were out of mixers. Popular item I guess. I found some other random stuff at Wally World and checked out. There were no lines there, matter of fact the checkers were waiting in front of their checkstands so I was pleased with the ease of shopping.

I then hit Target. I didn't get all of the stuff I wanted at Target but that was ok because they weren't dealbreakers for me. Hayley's big gift was the playhouse anyway so the Target stuff was just filler. Mostly I just got those new LED Christmas lights at Target. Long story which I will go into another day but I have numerous Christmas trees and each year I work hard to make them look like department store trees. All of my trees are done with white lights and while I appreciate the simplicity of white lights I also remember the excitement of the twinkling colored lights on our tree when I was a child. This is the first year Hayley totally "gets" Christmas so I am swapping out all of the white lights on our nine foot tree for colored LED lights. Usually I already have my tree up by this time on the day after Thanksgiving but I am learning with not one child but two that things are never going to be the same again. So instead I am blogging. Like I have nothing else to do.

My goal is to get all of my decorations out up by the end of the long weekend. Or at least to have all of them up before my two sisters come for the Christmas holiday. There is a very real possibility that I will be finishing the Christmas decorating on Christmas Eve, after we return from our brief trip to Canada. Have I mentioned that? We are going to Canada for only a few days- from the 20th to the 24th. My husband's brother from Texas will be going with his family and this is the first year that they have all gone for Christmas. We can't miss that. So anyway, you can imagine that December is already shaping up to be a very busy month for me. Oh yeah, and I go back to work full time on January 5th. Somewhere in all that I am going to have to figure out how to get out the door with two kids every morning.

I suppose now you could just say I am procrastinating. I really want to go get my trees out of the garage and start unpacking my decorations but I don't really have the energy. I guess I'm going to have to get a glass of OJ and let the sugar help move my feet.

If you were brave enough to face the Black Friday crowds I hope you got everything you wanted. And if you were the shopper that abandoned the Cuisinart knife set I thank you kindly.

Comments

[Don]

wish I knew where you got all your energy.
But you go girl.

[Mrs M]

A girl after my own heart, I love a good bargain too! I've got some great dressings for blocked milk ducts - will pop them in the post on Monday.

[Lee]

You're incredible! Send me some of that energy please!
Lee
ox