I just realized I forgot to post an entry regarding the Black Friday experience. I did really well, I got everything on my list and was home by 11:30, and had my rebates submitted by 11:37.
I started out at Meijers at 4 (a little late this year), but they had 99 of the tv I wanted, so it was no sweat. Had a blast hanging out in line with people I'll never see again, including a couple from Cedar Rapids, IA, who decided to stay over an extra night in spring-tucky so they could do their shopping here and have less chance of getting shot. Meijers was pretty tame, considering we could wait inside. Next year I'm considering doing the Best Buy line if they have something I want.
Which reminds me, BB did the coolest thing this year, and let us order stuff online Thursday at the Friday prices. I got the printer I wanted (which I would have missed out on had I waited in line, they only had 10 at our store), paid $8 shipping, but missed all the traffic and people at the store, which was fine.
Anyway, after I was done at Meijers (5:05) I headed to Joanns to wait for their 6am opening. There was a whole crowd of people waiting to get into Office Depot next door, so I stood outside by myself at Joanns just for comedic effect. One person in line at the fabric store, 50 at the office place. I was literally in and out of Joanns in 30 minutes. I think most people go to the store on the east side because the people are friendlier, but it really paid off to be on the west side that morning. I got 32 yards of fleece for the Feitshans Project, and that should just about finish us up for the year (yay!).
After Joanns I headed to Menards and called the Russian to find out where he was....oh yeah, just got up (after I called him at 6!) and was on his way to Menards. I directed him to Meijers to see if he could score some more play-doh stuff for my mom, and they were out. So he came to Menards and shopped for stuff in the store while I literally stood in line for an hour and a half! Halfway through I started regretting my decision to hit this Menards in particular...they only have 6 checkouts, and it was terribly slow, but the crowd was fun and we had a great time throwing stuff up and down the aisles to each other.
After Menards we went to Sam's Club for free breakfast and dog toys (or so I thought). They had plenty of the breakfast, no toys, but I ended up picking those up in Marion the next day. Anyway, I went to the other Joanns after that, got some more fleece and then headed home. Pretty successful day as far as BF goes...
Oh yeah, I got up Thursday morning and went to Meijers for Christmas lights in their ad ($1 a set, better than anybody else) and ran into a coworker. I hung out with him in line for awhile and found out that the girl in front of him was from CENTRALIA (!) and had driven to Springfield for the nano ipod ($99 for the 2-gig). She lives in Carbondale, and had to be in Centralia by noon for lunch. I think she probably made it, but holy cow! That's crazy! (For those of you paah, Centralia is about 2.5 hours from Springfield)
I can't wait for next year, but I hope the deals are better. There just wasn't anything that really got me super-excited this year, other than the Meijer tv deal, and that was for my mom ($99 for a 20" lcd, best deal I found). My mom and the Russian and I went to C-dale on Saturday and were amazed at how few people were out, it was kind of sad...what happened to the whole hustle and bustle thing?
I'm almost done with my shopping at this point. I need a couple of gift certificates and some stocking stuffers and then I'm calling it quits. Hopefully I can finish up this weekend in STL when we go see Mannheim.
Anyway, if you haven't already, sign up for an account at gottadeal.com...they have deals all year, and it's always nice to have free shipping, right?
BTW, the link on the front page for the pearls is supposed to get me a free set of pearl earrings soon. Ha! We'll see...I'm just testing it out...go to
100% this link to sign up for yours :) the Russian saw it and thought he was supposed to buy them for me for Christmas. Hahaha! Sorry Carl...