RobD

I think I was in 4th grade but my mom was not a big holiday person and she didn't put much effort into the Santa thing. My older DD was 11 when she stopped (2 years ago) and only because when we moved she saw the movers unpack the "santa" paper. My younger dd is 10 now and as far as we know (I've asked her sister to confirm this and she has) she still believes. I am actually at the point now where it would be much easier for me if she didn't but I would never tell her unless she asked me specifically. I know she still believes in the Tooth Fairy too. RobD

There is a Nintendogs Best Friends DS bundle available with the Nintendogs game and a special color DS unit for $149.99 at Amazon, Walmart & Target.

Scholastic Book Fairs has a great warehouse sale every December and May. It's one of my traditional shopping spots every year since my whole family has huge readers. They have warehouses in almost every state and the books are 50% off the cover price. In addition, scholastic has softcover editions of a lot of books that are only available in hard cover in retail sites so you end up saving even more. I hope the link posts. When you get to that page you click on your state name for the warehouses in your area. FYI, although I am not a school employee, I have never been asked when I've walked in. I sign in and put down that I am a book fair volunteer (which I am every year at my DD's school.) http://teacher.scholastic.com/fairs/warehouse/

We've also been using Netflix since the beginning of the summer. It's a lot easier than driving to the video store only to find out they don't have what we're looking for. In addition, the depth of their selection is much more than what the local video stores can carry (and that is also a storage issue, too not that the local video stores don't want to.) The other thing is that a lot of times we've forgotten about older movies that we've wanted to see and sitting home looking at a website with movies listed is a lot more productive than wandering aimless through the video aisles. I like the recommendation feature where after you've rated movies you enjoy, it gives you movies that you might like. A number of times we've said "hey, yeah, we wanted to watch that" but we would never have remembered it on our own. Our que is up to about 80 movies (DH, I and the 2 kids) and we do the 3 movies at a time option.

I was there yesterday and got the shower gels for $5 each and antibacterial hand soap 3/$10. With that purchase I got a $10 Tutti Frutti lip gloss free. I had a coupon for an American Girl free shampoo or conditioner with any AG purchase so the cashier rang me up separately for that one buying one body wash foam and getting a shampoo for free. When I checked out she also gave me a $10 coupon good for any in store purchase of $35 or more along with 3 free AG things: a 15 month locker calendar that has coupons for the year in it, a pack of AG postcards and a mini AG magazine which has the same coupon listed above for a free shampoo or conditioner in it! Yay!

Cranium Family Fun is in the book at the same price that WM has listed for BF plus there is a coupon for a card game (Cranium Ziggity) for free with any cranium game purchase. DD has family fun on her christmas list and I've had that Ziggity game in my cart about 3 times now so that works for me.

Just got my copy of "Costco Connection" and it has this to say about Thanksgiving weekend: Creative Cooking the Costco Way cookbook will be handed out free in the US warehouses Thanksgiving weekend to the 1st 1.5 million members. They will have "lots of special offers on merchandise in the warehouse and online on Thanksgiving weekend. Be sure to watch for our special coupon brochures in the warehouses starting the week before Thanksgiving."

Yes, because Santa uses different paper for each child and the child knows what presents are hers when they see the paper used to wrap the presents in their stockings. I usually only wrap 3-4/stocking and leave the little stuff unwrapped.

Do you think they'll mail out the coupons for these to the members like they do the "passports" or will they hand out the coupons at the door the week before or day of? I know that Costco never advertises in the paper. Thanks

I don't know what your budget is, but the USGA is allowing players to use laser range finders during play after Jan 1. My DH is a big golfer and he has mentioned a few times that that would be a "cool" thing to have. I've looked around and apparently Bushnell is the best brand in terms of quality and features but they run over $150. Ebay had some a lot cheaper but DH took a look and said they weren't worth the $20.

In a "non material" vein, our local churches have an Alternative Gift Market every year. They have 28 different organizations represented from a local "Save the River" organization to immunizations for children in Nepal and everything in between. The different organizations have different gift levels. For example, Holt International Children's Services offers a $30 gift to support 1 orphan & caregiver for 1 month; a $15 gift to support 1 orphan & caregiver for 2 weeks; or in the "children's area" a $1 gift to support 1 orphan & caregiver for 1 day. I started doing this for all the kids teachers and "club" leaders. I wanted to keep it to $5/person/gift and the teachers already have tons of knick knacks. My older DD came home last year after handing out the cards and was really shocked by how enthusiastic the teachers were about it (we gave them "school supplies for Iraqi children.") We also do this for my DH's aunt & uncle who want for nothing. We also have the kids use their money to do this for their aunts/uncles/grandparents. Beats trolling the Dollar store for 2 hours. You help people, and it's tax deductable.

If you go to Barnes & Noble's web site you can access GameStop and through Nov. 7th get 10% off selected video games. You can get there either by clicking on the PC and Video game tab at the top of the page or right now there is a link to "Save 10% on PC & Video Games" in the middle of the home page. The Nintendogs game cartridges are eligible for the 10% off but not the game system. I will tell you though that there is a new Nintendo DS Nintendogs bundle that comes with the Nintendo DS system complete with Nintendogs skin and a special edition Best Friends cartridge that has 6 of the most popular dogs. It is selling for $149.99 (as opposed to $129.99 for the Nintendo DS and $34.99 for the game.) It's so cute! I ordered mine through Amazon.com but I have seen it in Wal-Mart. I don't think it will be going on sale since it's a "special edition" and was just released on 10/24. Rob D