kren

I have a 2YO and a 6YO and I'm committed to it, since I've been a victim of three of the recalls this year and I am furious about it. The hard thing isn't for the 2YO; there's plenty online at specialty sites for him. But my 6YO is a tomboyish girl (no dolls or princess stuff) and I am finding it very hard to find stuff for her. I have resigned myself to not getting killer bargains for toys this year. But would love to exchange ideas with others on cool toys that aren't gonna poison the kids...

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thanks for the tips, loves30 and mrn8

Hey, on the Keens -- my hubby is REAL hard on shoes and we live in a very rocky, forested area with a rocky creek. He walks the dog every day on a long hike. I bought him a pair of Keens in the summer of 2005 from LL Bean and at the beginning of the summer of 2006, the stitching on an upper strap was coming apart. This maybe would've affected the sandal in, like, five years, when it finally got to a pressure point, but at any rate, I called LL Bean, told them the problem, and they sent me a return label and replaced them immediately. Since these are $99 shoes, I would HIGHLY recommend getting them from a place like LL Bean. They have the most awesome "satisfaction guaranteed" promise in the biz.

Thanks; will investigate.

I was hoping to make it through to BF 2007, but it isn't gonna happen. So what d'ya'll think would be the best deal I can make on a laptop this spring/summer? It doesn't have to be running Vista; I don't really care, but I think they'll all have that standard, right? So would 512M of RAM be OK for a Vista setup? Or do I have to get 1gig? Last year I got one for $400 at BF. Anyone think I can duplicate that *before* BF this year? Thanks

YMMV but last Wednesday in the back of Staples I found the ColorWonder sets (books plus markers plus templates) on clearance for $2.50 -- reg. $9.99.

Mixed results from Sears -- W/D have been OK, although the washer gets out of alignment way too much for my tastes (and I don't overstuff the drum). The fridge is AWESOME, and I would buy it again in a heartbeat. Dishwasher is OK at cleaning and also quiet. But the gas stove is a piece o crap and I would advise everyone never to buy it. All the kitchen apps are high-end SS. But the stove, where you REALLY need wearability, has faux stainless on many of its parts (cheap silver plastic, for instance). And sealed burners (it's gas) are a joke -- stuff gets inside the drip trays and rusts. The pull bars for the oven are metal (not SS, but made to look like it) but they're held on with PLASTIC connectors. How screwed up is that? All are Kenmore brand. So I guess the moral of the story is it's a crapshoot, and you should really really do your research on specific model numbers before plunking down the money.

Even better if you're near a Spirit Airlines airport. They have AWESOME deals. We flew to Florida and back for $144 total for four people. They have deals like 1-cent airfares all the time. Obviously there are heavy restrictions, but if you're a leisure traveler, you can make those dates work for you! Highly recommended! Here's the Web site; sign up for their e-mail alerts to get notified about the insanely cheap promos: www.spiritair.com

OK, Gen X talking here -- I'm pretty geeky but have resisted moving from CDs to MP3/iPOD/whatever players because I resent the HECK out of not actually having complete control over my songs. From my research (while buying 13YO stepdaughter Creative Zen MicroPhoto 8G player for Xmas - $99 AR - not bad) I discovered that almost none of the music services really *give* you your songs, even though you pay for it. They have copy protections that range from limiting how many times you can copy the song you (legally) bought to actually making your music disappear if you, f'rinstance, cancel a monthly subscription. How crappy is that? No thank you! And I don't wanna go the P2P route; the record companies are getting pretty nasty and I don't want any more virus risks than I already face. Soooo, until these dratted copy protections disappear, I will stick with music I really, truly own. Just my 2 cents.

Thanks for the tip!

I'm not a coffee snob -- I buy Starbucks, yeah, but I make them grind it for me, which the purists would shudder at. You're not supposed to grind anything you won't use up in, like, an hour. I'm not a coffee snob, but between my husband and I (who works at home), we go through a pound of Starbucks every two days. We drink a LOT of coffee. That's why grinding it just won't work -- it just takes too darn long! That said, we know something about what coffee makers stand up to our abuse *and* make good coffee. We recommend a brand no one has mentioned: Capresso. You can check out their reviews on Amazon; we own a $200 model that froths milk for lattes. Very nice feature; everyone who comes to our house wants a latte now. We have an espresso machine also, but that whole ritual is just too much of a pain. With the Capresso, we make it extra-strong, and even though it's automatic drip, we get the coffee ground finer than normal, and all that means we get good strong coffee. The unit comes with a stainless steel carafe -- a MUST if you're knocking pots around like us. It keeps the coffee good and hot for a couple of hours, which is the most a pot ever lasts around us, and most important: the coffee isn't sitting there on a hot plate, getting burned. The other good thing about Capresso: their distributor is in Long Island and a human being picks up the phone. We've had two Capresso pots and both work great (the old one we put in the closet in favor of the frothing model, but it's still good also), but in eight years we have dealt with customer service for a couple of different problems. The auto drip lever broke on the first one, and on the second one, something in the power mechanism died fairly quickly. We got a replacement within a week, no probem. Long message. Great coffeemaker. Hope it helps.

We'll be hitting the House of Mouse for only one day at the end of January. Gate price is $67 apiece. We will have to buy three tickets (I think my son, who turned 2 a couple of weeks ago), is still free. There's a timeshare operation that's advertising two one-day tix to Disney World for $25. You have to sit through a 90-minute timeshare presentation, in Orlando, I presume. We've sat through a few of these in the past; we know how to resist. My question is: has anyone else heard anything good or bad about these guys? http://www.discountthemeparkvacations.com The company behind this Web site is something called HotelsCorp.com. Thanks!

Oh, the Amazon.com wish list system is the best. It can be public or private (you can set up your own "to buy for the kids" list and keep it private) and each kid can have their own. The kid can set priority levels based on how much they want the item. There's space for the buyer to mark off when item is bought. And it's for all of Amazon (which includes Target, etc.) so it's not just books/CDs. Highly recommended...

heck, that's more than i ever got from them. their customer service blows....

Thanks for the tip on Kohl's, Brad. Maybe it'll be one of the 50% off toys next Wednesday....I can only hope.

I'd like to find this for $30 or less -- I've seen it as low as $35 on BF (but couldn't get it). Any leads? My big question, though, is why there's such a HUGE price difference from store to store. At Amazon the thing is $90 and at Wal-Mart it's $40. What the heck??

Thanks much for all the sale preview info! One question: I'm looking for the F-P "shake and go speedway" .... it oftentimes isn't in stock in stores, but is on the Web site. Would this 50% off toys deal next Wednesday be good online as well? Thanks!

This is in Allentown Morning Call, front page of the Friday paper: Bargain hunter outrage: Where's my TV? By Sam Kennedy Of The Morning Call Josh Mertz was flabbergasted. The TVs he had seen advertised in the newspaper were all gone. How could it be? The 26-year-old Danielsville resident had gotten up before dawn on Black Friday to get the fifth spot in line at Home Depot. He had been waiting an hour and a half when, at 6 a.m., the Whitehall store’s doors parted. Mertz and the customers in front of him rushed inside to get their hands on the 32-inch LCD-screen high-definition televisions they had seen pictured in a circular with a price tag of $478. They went directly to the center of the store, where the deeply discounted TVs were supposed to be, only to find that all had been claimed. When Mertz and the others made their way to the front of the store, they were astonished to see people checking out with TVs in their carts. Confronted by angry customers, a store manager said employees had been given first dibs. “I was just absolutely disgusted that they would pull something like this,” Mertz said. Initially, Mertz’s account was met with disbelief by Home Depot. “No. Not true,” Don Harrison, who works at Home Depot’s corporate headquarters in Atlanta, said on Tuesday. “The man is not being truthful with you.” But two days later, on Thursday night, Home Depot confirmed that workers bought TVs before customers had the chance. Additionally, the company promised to donate $4,000 — the retail cost of the TVs that the employees got — to a local charity to be determined later. The admission came after several store employees, who said they did not want to be named because they feared for their jobs, spoke to The Morning Call. According to the employees: Of the 10 TVs Home Depot had in stock, nine were snatched up by their co-workers, or in one case by a co-worker’s daughter, who were allowed into the store before its opening.

Hah. $56 schmixty-wix. I got EIGHT DOLLARS each way back in October. Four tickets from Atlantic City to Orlando, round-trip, for $64. The airport fees and 911 surcharges ended up costing almost as much as the tickets! $146 total for four of us. Such a deal! If you sign up for Spirit's e-mail alerts, you too can get these deals. They had one a few weeks after my deal for SEVEN dollars each way. I was actually upset for a couple of minutes until I realized I was only paying $8 more than that. Tee-hee!

Next year I'm planning work better. I worked Thanksgiving night, got out at 1, drove to Staples and was second in line. Got every single thing on my list, but had to wait an hour to check out (note to self: Next year, put the kid in line as soon as you get in the door). Left at 7 a.m.. .. I figured I would be way too late to get the Star Wars Millenium Falcon transformer for 50% off at Target, but got that by 7:30. Went to Kohls, managed to unearth three Leapster cartridges ($16 instead of $25-plus) behind piles of toy rubble, and scored a Pirates of the Caribbean pinball machine for $30. Total success -- got everything I wanted. Except by then it was 9, I hadn't slept since Thursday morning, and I had to work Friday night also. I managed to get four hours of sleep and was really pushing it to drive, work, and drive home without killing myself from exhaustion. Next year, I'm taking a day off!

Update: Went back today and found the same manager who not only credited my credit card for the sale price, but gave me instant savings to replace the yesterday-early-bird-only Easy Rebate. What a guy! My Staples (in NE Pa) rocks!

I have to schlep back to Staples tomorrow because I just checked my receipt and paid FULL PRICE for the external DVD burner. ACK! The horror!!! I waited for hours, was second in the door, asked the MANAGER where the external DVD burner was, he went and got it and personally placed it in my hands. So I figure I have the right one and certainly *he* knows what he's doing. I bought tons of stuff, and was in a frenzied store, so I didn't check anything against the cash register read-out or the receipt until I got home and tried to enter all my easy rebates. According to the ad, this drive is supposed to have an instant one and an easy one but it looks like he handed me a different one. No rebate. No instant savings either. I'm crushed.

Well I'm going back because in all the frenzy I ended up paying full price for the darn DVD burner at Staples! I can't believe it!!! I waited most of the night, was second in the door, asked the manager where the external DVD burner was, he went IN BACK to get it for me and personally put it in my hands, and so doh, I never figured I had to make sure it was the right one, and lo and behold, I check the miles of receipts and there's no discount for it. Blech. Gotta go yell.

Quick help anyone? We have an OLD DVD player (2000 -- ack!) and my dad, who's well-meaning but electronically clueless, bought us a Coby portable model so he could show us his recorded home movies on DVD. Well, it read the format fine, but it's such a cheap-o model that it's already not working half the time. So we need a real DVD player -- not a cheap one, preferably upconverting, and one that will read all the DVD flavors (well, not HD -- we don't have a TV worth worrying about that). I've checked the ads and just don't see one that looks decent for a decent price. Plenty of portables -- don't need 'em. Plenty of not-so-well-thought-of $20/$30 ones that don't appear to support DVD-R AND DVD+R ... And then there are $100-plus ones that are too much. Any advice? TIA!