outnumbered

My favorite thing has been shopping with my mom each year, when I lived close enough to make that possible...we'd form plans, hit the stores, and stop for Starbucks all before 8 am Now that we live 2000 miles apart, I like knowing that we're at least both out there at (mostly) the same time, even if it's not together. Also love that I can actually afford presents for my kids at the BF prices!

To follow up on my post in the tech forum--it's shopping time! Looking for a good laptop with directX video card, capable of gaming, alienware-ish rather than $400 special, but obviously as good a price as possible. Under $1k as opposed to over would be good, and things sold by best buy or anywhere that I can bring it in for warranty service if needed would be a plus. Will be used for skyrim and lots of skyping in addition to basic tasks like my facebook addiction.

Started in last night with the purchase of a DS Lite on Amazon for the $98 price. Left with my mom and sister at 3:30 and got to JCPenney's a bit before 4. Picked up snowglobe for my other sister who had to work, got six pairs of the $9.99 jeans for my kids and a few other clothing items. Went to Sears but didn't like anything once I tried it on. Hit Starbucks and then left the mall for Walmart. Arrived at 5:30 am and was too late to get the DS Lites there--and it was such a madhouse with every possible walking area jammed with people and shopping carts that we just left--even so it took 10 min to find our way to the exit. Went to Kohls and got clothes, toys, home decor stuff for various people, using $10 coupon that was on my newspaper and got $20 in Kohls Cash too. Went back to the mall and considered going in GameStop but the line was just crazy long and not moving. Decided not to get used DS Lites after all and just hope for getting in on another deal later. Went to Disney Store and made out with LOTS of stuff for cheap--things that were usually $20 or $25 were on sale for $10 and then with an extra 20% off that made them $8 each (dolls, stuffed animals, etc). But the line was an hour and a half long! I had NO idea it was going to be that long to get through it; it hadn't looked that bad. Got in line around 8:30 and was at the register at 10 on the dot, when the extra 20% off expired, though I think I heard they were going to keep honoring that for people who'd been in line. Went home, ate, passed out! All the workers and fellow shoppers I saw were very polite, with the exception of the Walmart madhouse, so I was glad I didn't stick around there overnight to get tickets for the cheap tv and DS Lites. Still on a DS quest though since I only have one and need three. Will probably try Kmart tomorrow and see what kind of coupon they have (they're offering a $25 "nintendo gaming coupon"--as long as it's not a mail-in kind of thing I'll probably get them that way if they're in stock).

THANK YOU! I got one right before they sold out. Tried to log out and have my dad buy another (I need a total of three) and they were sold out by the time I had done that...but very glad to have gotten one as my Walmart is having people line up as early as 8 and all the items are ticketed...I cannot be there from 8 pm to 5 am! So online is going to have to be the way to go. One down, two to go...thank you thank you!

I haven't seen Bakugan on the shelves at TRU or Target in months. Every time I go, they're sold out. I say snap it up while you can.

It's rare that I pick up anything for myself on BF. Usually my budget is tight enough that I have only enough $$ for gifts, and no extra.

Last year, I didn't actually buy anything at my first store--I just wanted (a) into the mall, and ( the snowglobe for my sister who wanted one but was watching my kids. So it was probably all of 30 seconds. Into the store, get snowglobe, high-tail it to the exit, head to KB Toys. I think my time there (KB, the first store where I bought something) was under 20 min.

My theme is "everything big and clunky and handmade towards the bottom so the tree doesn't tip!" This is a change from "everything breakable up towards the top! Wait, he/she grew--put it higher!"

Probably Murrieta and Temecula, CA.

I like the admin-defined prefixes and the picture galleries best. I like the idea of tagging threads, but I can't see it working well here. I can see people tagging threads using four or five different spellings/abbreviations of the same word, which would defeat the whole purpose. If you could set tags and then people could use them, that'd be one thing, but letting 150,000+ people all create their own tags--I just can't see that working out well. The prefixes, though, would be helpful and ought to work.

Now that's just cold, lol. Glad they had plenty and you got one, though!

I'm hitting the mall again tomorrow, but now I'm home again instead of at my parents' house, and "home" is a much busier area. I actually anticipate more crowds tomorrow than I saw today. But the Sears I was at had a really bad selection in some clothing sections and I need to try again at this one. I just need to get a few more things and I'll be done--but I may have to run out and get a paper, because I left all my Thanksgiving newspapers at my parents' house (why bring home piles of trash?)...oops. Should have clipped the Saturday coupons first! Anyone get a paper today? Are there coupons for tomorrow in it? I can still run out if there are.

Not a big haul this year, but there wasn't much I was dying to get and my budget was low, so, all in all I think it worked out well enough. 4 am: arrived at JCP. Got snowglobe (for my sister who was watching my kids), booked it out of the store and went to the KB Toys line. Was tenth! Totally didn't expect to be so close. 5 am: KB Toys opened. They let EVERYONE in at once, saying they'd only limit the # of people inside if the fire marshal told them to. I walked in, grabbed the Roboreptile for $40, got the big Magnetix case for $40, got two gameboy advance games (buy 1 get 1 free), and the Monopoly game ($2 after rebate, still dirt cheap before rebate). Waited maybe 5 min in line and left. 5:30ish? Dropped bags off at car, returned to mall. Stopped in at Old Navy briefly. Found sweater I liked, saw that sweater was only $5 off regular price, saw 100-person-long line...ditched sweater. Went to Sears. Spent an ungodly amount of time looking around in there because I hadn't had a chance to look over the ad on here, and it wasn't in my paper!! Grrr. But got a bunch of gifts for people, used my $25 gift card from mypoints, used my $10 off coupon with Sears card purchase, etc., got good deals overall. 7:30ish? Went to Starbucks for the morning coffee I didn't get before heading out. Good LORD that line was slow. But I had to have that coffee to continue. 8:15: Finally had my coffee and breakfast wrap. Drove to Target in search of Roboraptor. They were out but some guy said they had them at Big 5. Left Target, went to Big 5. Found a different Roboreptile (same item as the one I got at KB Toys, different color, $10 more). Decided it was worth the $10 extra to get it in green, DS#2's favorite color, and DS#1 would get the other one, and there'd be no fighting over who got the cool remote control dinosaur. Paid for Roboreptile. Received sales pitch on Roboreptile from a clerk standing next to the clerk helping me (yeah, AFTER I was paying for it, lol). 9ish?? Went to Kohl's. Viewed 400-person-long line at Kohl's. Left Kohl's. Went to Lakeshore Learning so my other sister could use some coupons she had. They didn't appear to have anything on sale so I just got a couple cheap stocking stuffer items. 10ish: returned to my parents' house and napped! I'm almost completely done shopping, so I think it was time well spent. And the Roboreptiles are totally going to be the hit of Christmas this year with my boys, and I definitely couldn't have afforded them at $90-100 each, so I'm happy with that deal. I really wasn't impressed with the deals on much else, but...oh well. The upside was I was at a GREAT place to shop. I have never seen a mall that NOT crowded on BF. I'll have to spend every Thanksgiving at my parents' new place, lol.

I usually do some snooping around as BF approaches, but this year I'll be shopping with my mom in her new neighborhood, many miles away, so no sneak peeks this year. I'm actually really nervous, lol, going to stores I've never been to before. I need to at least know the store layout!

Thanks everyone for the ideas... I'm getting him the SP because of the backlit screen--so he can play after dark, since it gets dark so early now. But dh does have an old GBA, not the SP, and I may think about still doing the SP for Christmas and letting him just borrow dh's GBA, if it still works. It's been through two deployments to Iraq so I'm not sure if it's still working. He has a leapster but has outgrown it. Apparently they're not all that cool anymore, lol, and he's not into those games as much as regular video games now. He's going to be lending his leapster to his sister (3) so she can play it. I've bought her two girly games for it so she ought to have fun on the road. We were thinking of a dvd player, too, but one with the dual screens...bought on BF to keep it cheaper. I swear, this move happening sooner is screwing up our plans big-time, lol. So the used ones still work ok? I wouldn't mind buying him a used one, I'd just be afraid there was something wrong with it. If we wind up going full price, I guess we'll go with Walmart. We'll have to decide on all this soon though. We leave in just over a week! :)

The big "Santa" gift this Christmas for my oldest (almost 7) was going to be a Gameboy Advance SP, because it would be a great thing for him to have on our 4-day-long drive to CA, and since our move was going to take place near Christmas, the timing was perfect. I was hoping there'd be a great deal on them on BF like there was last year (and maybe even the year before that) so I was going to wait till BF to get one. Now it turns out we're moving much sooner--we leave on the 10th of Nov. So I can't wait till BF to get one. My choices as I see them are to either look for some sort of deal right now, and if nothing else, buy it at the PX so I don't pay sales tax...or to buy one at a store that will hopefully have them on sale on BF, then buy another one on BF, and return that new one with the receipt from the one I buy before our trip. Probably not ethical, but I'd at least still get the cheaper price. That would only work if I guessed right and the store I purchased at did indeed sell them--and didn't bring in a special package or something--on BF. A full-price gameboy is really WAY out of our price range for a "just for the heck of it" type of purchase. But it would also save my sanity for the drive, so I really want him to have it now and not give it to him for Christmas. So a great sale or something right now would be wonderful. I only need the system itself; DH has games and a few of them would be ok for a first grader.

My five-year-old wanted to be a clone trooper for Halloween. Ebay had a few costumes for about $25 including shipping, but I didn't buy them because I wanted to wait till our next paycheck to buy costumes. By the time we got paid again, that seller was out, I guess, because I haven't seen any more listed for that price. I've talked him into being a Power Ranger instead because I wasn't going to pay $30-40 for a costume, and that's all I can find right now. I think your best bet is just to keep checking ebay, and have a backup costume in mind. I haven't seen any retail site with the costume for less than $30.

I normally make a good breakfast but this year I think we are going to be in a hotel, and will probably just have pop-tarts or something in the car. It's going to be one interesting Christmas this year.

I was told last year that the Pixter I was buying for my son had a 45-day return policy on it, because it was an electronic toy. So I'm not at all surprised that they're still classifying toys that way this year. I do hope they stay around, though. They have a huge selection here, whereas Walmart and Target don't. I prefer to shop for toys at Walmart because it's closer and their prices are lower, but a lot of times Walmart just doesn't have what I'm looking for--and TRU always does.

But being first into the store also means being among the first to check out. I don't want to spend two hours in line at the first store, so I'd want to be among the first however many people anyway, at whatever store I went to. Can't hurt to get $10 for waiting when I was going to wait anyway. That was my thinking last year, anyway. This year has yet to be planned....

LOL...I find the idea of a business wanting to keep their number private very amusing.

Do people really still use 411? The internet makes it really easy to find a phone number for free.

I just tried to order a bunch of gamecube and xbox games and everything I tried to get was gone. They all showed as available; then all but 2 weren't in stock when I tried to check out, and the 2 that it let me check out with apparently weren't there either as I kept getting error messages that it wouldn't accept my order at this time.

That's exactly why I've never used a chair before...but this year I think I might actually get to go with a friend! She and I both want to go, and both our husbands are here, so we may be able to both go this year. If that's the case, we'll be able to bring stuff and have one of us go back and stash it in the car. :)

It's been a long time since I've been in December...I think the last time that happened was the end of 2001. Keep in mind that lots of schools will be on winter break, so it will be nearly as crowded as it is during the summer. It's beautiful though. :) Definitely do NOT go on a weekend. The middle of the week is the best time to go regardless of the time of year. If you email Disneyland's customer service, they will send you whatever info you request--park maps, calendars of events, etc.--to help you plan your visit. They are very helpful. I'd give you the link to their contact info but the website won't work in Firefox, apparently. Won't load for me now, even though it did several months ago...weird. Anyway, either someone else can link you or you should be able to find their email address pretty easily. Have fun planning!