budgetsRsexy

Thanks for all the great laughs everyone, very well done!

My info has been sent. Thank you yet again for allowing me to join in on the fun. I'm very excited to participate!

I cant say that I've lost that loving feeling for BF exactly, I'm just lost how to celebrate it this year. We wont be having Thanksgiving in small town America for the first time as my grandparents both passed and we sold the house. Instead I'll be spending BF in the larger city where I live for the first time. Another first is that my half of the family is not doing presents and my husband's half only wants gift cards. I had planned to take the advise of other GD members to put my shopping skills to good use for a charity, but a child of a coworker of mine got a very bad medical diagnosis so I donated my remaining vacation time to her instead of cashing it in to pay for Christmas charity/shopping/gifting. It seems silly to go out on BF if I'm not going to buy anything but BF is a tradition that I share with my Dad. I'm sure my dad and I will eventually come up with something to adapt to all this, it's just a little sad and almost like the end of an era for us.

It snowed yesterday morning and then last night I saw my first Christmas commercial. It just got real

My team is not playing on Thanksgiving but honestly I don't think I would let football stop me from shopping. I say that THIS year because my team is the Cleveland Browns and it's just getting too painful to watch some of the games. I'm used to them not being good, but this just hurts [emoji24]

My FIL has everything he needs and he has the finances to buy what he wants when he wants it so he is always the one we struggle on ideas for. We try to go with experiences that we can do together when we are in town visiting . He seems to like what we have come up with in the past and we have made some great memories together.

Normally ours goes up the week after Thanksgiving. Last year the lights on it were acting odd and took some tinkering to get them to work so this year it's going up the weekend before Thanksgiving. That should give me time to find out if I need to replace it on BF or not.

Target, Kohl's and JCPenney are the big ones, but I'm definitely going to hit Joann's and PetSmart as well so it would be nice to see theirs too (even though they don't change much from year to year).

I have friends that intentionally do all their gift shopping on Christmas Eve and I think this extra weekend will impact last minute shoppers like them the most. I would think that in store selection will be more picked over than normal by the last weekend. On the other hand this extra time might improve people's chances of their online shopping items being delivered in time for the holidays.

Thanks for sharing magickallight and Kanyon71, I had never thought of doing special Christmas Eve presents of pjs before. I love the idea! I bet it makes for some great photos

I avoid going to their brick and mortar store during the holidays (the parking lot at the closest one is poorly designed and accidents are common when there is high traffic volumes ). With constant free shipping they might actually get some of my holiday budget for once. Can't wait for their ad to come out now!

Good point bribri25, my math was faulty and there are definitely better sales on certain items (the throws, cookie sheets that they do every year, etc.). I guess the advantage in October is that I have time to browse and try things on. The other possible advantage of shopping now is selection in store, especially in terms of the clearance sections (to help stretch your dollar a bit further). I guess I'll just have to do some shopping now and some on BF too.

In the mail I just got a 20% off coupon with triple Yes2You rewards points and it is valid 10/24-10/30 which overlaps a $10 kohls cash reward offer for every $50 spent from 10/27-10/30. If my math is correct (please feel free to double check my math) this ends up being a better deal than their normal BF deal of $15 kohls cash for every $50 spent, especially the more you spend. You might want to consider doing some holiday shopping now if you can get the coupon online as the sale gets closer

I have never been first in line, but I have had the first person in line save my unprepared butt one year. I started getting a migraine while waiting out in the cold at JCPenney probably in my 2nd year of going out on BF. I stepped out of line and started asking if anyone had some excedrine and the first person in line was a pro and had a whole pharmacy of over the counter meds in their purse. It was very kind of them to share with me and people even let me back in line where I had been instead of going to the end of line (which I was prepared to to the moment I went hunting for meds, totally worth losing my spot to get meds that saved my whole BF).

I'm relying on the ads to help me with some ideas for my own wishlist! I'm struggling to come up with things that fall in the right budget range and heaven knows what my husbands side of the family might think up if left entirely to their own devises [emoji15] I love them dearly but there have been some unusual things under the Christmas tree over the years [emoji3]

Here is an article on it from Fortune: http://fortune.com/2016/10/17/macys-thanksgiving-black-friday/ Hope that helps!

I have always spent Thanksgiving and therefore BF at my grandparents. Now that they have both left us I will be spending Thanksgiving and BF in my home city for the first time. I am familiar with the store layouts and multiple routes to get to them. Due to the size of my city we have multiples of most major stores. Any suggestions on how to figure out which ones I should go to besides physical location (and proximity to other stores I'm interested in hitting)? I have no idea which ones draw the bigger crowds or if one usually has better in store stock supplies/availability for BF items. Any suggestion on how to figure that out?

So I don't have kids but I can remember what my sister and I got in our stockings over the teen and adult years. My mom was very strict about no makeup until we were 15 so she had to come up with other ideas, which usually were related to interests: gardening stuff (hand rake/trowel, miracle grow fertilizer stakes and seeds; craft supplies (beads and jewelry wire, scrapbook paper and embellishments, sketch books and charcoal pencils, yarn and crochet hooks/knitting needles, fabric with needles and thread); cooking or baking tools (cute cupcake liners, icing decorating tips and bags, sprinkles, measuring cups and measuring spoons, food extracts, food coloring); books and bookmarks For my dad and later my husband I have seen or purchased: hunting and fishing items (pocket hand warmers, scent removing soap, warm boot socks, fishing lures/hooks/line); gym/exercise items (shoe deodorizer balls for their gym bag, fitness jump rope, travel size shower items, bag balm if they do things like pull ups and tear up their hands, bandaids, icy hot and Advil for sore muscles, reusable ice packs); grilling items (grill scrubber/cleaner, propane tank gas gauge, shish-kabob skewers, dry rubs and marinades); jerky, cashews/almonds/pistachios And earbuds because everyone manages to need a new pair every year or two

I miss Bonton and their great BF coupons! The last one in our area closed about 5 years ago.

I've never tried it with frozen ones but if you thawed them first I don't see why not. You may need to adjust the cooking time though but I would think it's worth a shot to experiment.

Maple glazed Brussels sprouts with bacon (who knew these vegetables could taste good!) Ingredients 1 pound Brussels sprouts, trimmed 1/4 cup extra-virgin olive oil 3 tablespoons pure maple syrup 4 slices raw bacon, cut into 1/2-inch pieces (I usually add more slices as my husband loves bacon) 1/2 teaspoon salt 1/4 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper Directions Preheat oven to 400 degrees F (200 degrees C). Place Brussels sprouts in a single layer in a baking dish or tinfoil covered cookie sheet. Drizzle with olive oil and maple syrup; toss to coat (sometimes I toss in a ziplock bad to get a better coating and then empty onto a cookie sheet in a single layer). Sprinkle with bacon; season with salt and black pepper. Roast in the preheated oven until bacon is crispy and Brussels sprouts are caramelized, 45 minutes, stirring halfway through. NOTE: I cut my sprouts in half so that the maple syrup has more surface area to coat. Doing this may mean you will want to reduce the cooking time a little but it really depends on the oven. Just keep an eye on them so the syrup/sugar coating doesn't get burnt

This is my MIL's recipe that she shared with me as they are my husbands favorite. I think she would be happy to know that they may become a part of someone else's family tradition: Press Cookies 1 Cup softened margarine 3 oz. softened cream cheese 1 Cup sugar 1 egg yolk Cream above "wet" ingredients together. 2 1/2 Cups flour 1/2 teaspoon salt Mix dry ingredients together and add dry ingredients in batches to mixer bowl containing the wet ingredients. 1 teaspoon almond flavor Add to mixer bowl and mix all ingredients until well blended. Add cookie dough to press and form cookies. Bake pressed cookies at 350 degrees for 7-8 minutes or until cookies just barely begin to brown. PS. I use the oxo good grips cookie press because it takes the guess work out of how much cookie dough to use per cookie.

I feel like I remember that some friends on the west coast were able to use the 20% off coupon on the online BF deals as the sale went live on Kohls.com at midnight central time Sunday night? Might be worth teaming up with some friends or family you have on the west side. I also just checked the kohls forum from 2015 and it looks like others were able to share other codes that worked no matter where you lived so hopefully people will share any they find again this year!

We do lists in my family but it's more a guide to help with ideas for the adults. Sometimes you get exactly what was on the list and other times people deviate a little (or a lot, but it usually turns out to be something you just didn't know you wanted [emoji12]). This year I'm struggling to come up with things to put on my own list [emoji15] (never thought I'd see the day where I couldn't come up with a wish list!)

Can I just say how fun it is to come on here and find new posts all the time now! I love it that things have picked up pace and that more and more people seem to be returning for the BF "season."