All She Wants for Christmas

We've spent the last 5 days in DFW at my parents' house, and I'm pretty sure I have enough blog material for the rest of the year. We have had so much fun with my family. I will blog about Thanksgiving and post a bajillion pictures of the kids and cousins (we had a family portrait session where about 1400 pictures were taken), but I wanted to talk Black Friday for a bit.

I LOVE Black Friday. I love the fun of getting up at dawn, list and coupons in hand, and plan out exactly where we're going to go. I'm usually home and finished before lunch. It's not the "camping outside the store and I am going to GET THAT giant TV for $199" part of Black Friday that I love, it's the "get up early to do some fun shopping with the girls and see how many other crazy people are out at 5am in their comfy clothes" part that I enjoy. This year was a bit different, with so many stores opening at midnight or before, there were hardly any crowds when we were shopping from 5-8am. No madness. No lines. No crazies. It took a little bit of wind out of our sails to NOT get tackled by a middle age woman at 5am in her pajamas, but it was kind of nice to get a lot of shopping done, still get some great deals, and finished in record time.

My side of the family is not really big on "surprise" gifts for Christmas. Lists are made and exchanged. Gift cards are almost expected. And a receipt is always included. But I gotta tell you, my mom took the Christmas wish list to new levels this year. I'm just going to share with you an email that I got from my mom last week:

I don't know who was planning to get gifts for who, but I looked around and found some ideas. You might can go in together if it's more than you wanted to spend. I'm sure the stuff will be cheaper on black Friday or Thanksgiving day

Also, there might be some coupons online to print off to save more $.

At Target, (these jacket things are in the section that says Womens and Morona is written on the wall with a big picture of a lake and lady & girl . It's down the isle by the make up. It's a zipper hoodie sweatshirt with fluffy lining on a rack with wheels. I need a small-1st choice is burgundy, 2nd choice is gray. Regular price is $27.00. # on tag is 016/02/4061

Also at Target, Mossimo regular hoodie sweatshirt in small and gray. Regular price is $19.99. The FM store is out of smalls in gray. It has 2 white strings by hoodie. It's in the front section across the aisle from the hats & scarfs.

Kohls-go in right door and look to the right and in the work out area. The wall says Tek Gear. Reversible with fluffy showing on outside. Regular price is $48.00 They were 1/2 price when I looked. Grey in small 00920 36895 on tag.

Belk- towards the middle of the far right wall in store. Jackets are against wall-Jane Ashley brand 100 polyester. $40.00 on sticker-style is 20025-Khaki/white. Says casual Lifestyle on tag. Fake fur at collar and cuffs and strip down center of both sides. Size small- On sale for $27.99

7-97640-84996-9 on tag

Penneys- White zipper sweatshirt hoodie-Arizona brand-not lined-size small Reg price of $36.00 644-4101-0101-03

Also black with fluffy gray lining zipper sweatshirt hoodie. Medium size-$46.00 regular price. 664-4100-0300-04

I hid these 2 items in the section that has a sign that says Womens Sleepwear (across from the bra section) There's a picture on the wall of a girl with a dog. There are long housecoats hanging to the right of the wall picture against the wall and they're behind those housecoats.on the floor.

I bet they'll be cheap on Thursday or Friday.

Seriously. This is the Christmas wish list she gave us this year. Brand names. Colors. Item numbers. And when "pre-shopping" earlier this week, my mom actually took items off their rack and hid them under a rack of housecoats so we could find them later. And she hid them effectively:

Womens Sleepwear

Girl with a dog

Long housecoats

And on the floor under them?

You guessed it. The coveted hooded sweatshirts. Yes, my mom requested six different hooded sweatshirts for Christmas this year.

Here's the kicker. She swears that she's not the only person who sees something she likes at a store, and, instead of buying it, hides it somewhere so that no one else finds it so that she can come back and get it later, like when it's on sale. My mom is convinced that this is totally normal behavior that everyone does, and that it's not weird at all. But what gets me, is that it's not exactly the hard-to-find door buster item that she has hidden beneath the housecoats. They're hooded sweatshirts from the JC Penney.

On Thanksgiving day, when we were mercilessly laughing at/with my mom about this list, she urged me to survey my blog readers to see how many other people employ the "pre-shop then stash the goodies in random parts of the store so you can find them later when it's on sale" method of shopping. Since I don't know how to put an actual survey in my post, could you do me a favor? If you are guilty of this shopping habit, please fess up and comment so that my mom will know she is not alone. If you do not employ this practice, feel free to let me know that I am not the only one who thinks this is just a teensy bit out of the ordinary.

And, if you're wondering what you can get my mother for Christmas, now you have a couple of *vague* ideas.