black friday madness

I have never been one to get too involved with Black Friday shopping. In years past we may have gone out later in the day, but not until a few years ago had I ever even thought about getting up early.

This year after we cleaned up from Thanksgiving, Jeff and April showed up and we settled in with a piece of pie and and a stack of sale papers. Up to this point I had done zero shopping for Christmas, and I had zero ideas of what to even get. As April, Karee and I perused the ads and enjoyed lemon cream pie yumminess we hatched a plan.

The Toys R Us sale started at midnight. While I should have been exhausted after the endless cooking and cleaning, my senses must have momentarily left me while I recharged with bites of pumpkin and coconut cream (yes I did have multiple pieces of pie - I made them all and by golly I was going to enjoy them!)

If we hit the toy store at midnight, we then could hit several other stores as the night/morning wore on and we would successfully find all our heart's desires (or rather our children's) for the very best price ever.

Right?

Wrong...

We did venture out and we did hit all the stores but the amount of people with the exact same plan as us was staggering. I have never seen such lines and such craziness.

Yes we did find a few good deals - especially Jake on some hot item electronics. But was the loss of an entire night's sleep really worth it? NO!

At 6:00am while still in line at Walmart, Jeff called looking for April. Their baby was awake and hungry. Did we plan on being home soon? Well we certainly thought so but never underestimate the time it takes to actually make it to the register with those treasures. An HOUR later we finally made it home. But then I had to go back and get Jake and Karee and wait in line again. I made it home at 8:30

I took a 45 minute nap of sorts and then we set out again for another sale. I know... we really are a bit crazy. But this sale really was worth it. It was the monthly bag sale at a used clothing store for kids. Once a month they have a sale where you can fill up a bag for only a dollar. I have found the most amazing things at these sales and April was so excited to be in town at the right time for one. And it payed off for her. Big time. She found an entire garbage bag full of Geo Trax. Probably at least $60-75 worth of stuff and it cost her $1. Amazing. I was so excited for her.

We finally staggered home at 11:30 where we got to spend the rest of day taking care of kids!

I don't think I will ever do such a thing again, but in the end it was fun to hang out with April and Karee and join in on the craziness just once!