Christmas shopping

I actually went shopping the day after Thanksgiving this year. Well, actually that is a lie. I went to the mall the day after Thanksgiving with absolutely no intentions of buying anything. My mother, who is a huge shopaholic, convinced me to go.

Its about an hour drive for us to the closest city with a mall. Needless to say, I hardly ever go there. Occasionally, I'll need something at Babys-R-Us and so I'll make the trek. But in general, I hate shopping. And now that I stay at home its pretty much pointless to look at things you are not going to be buying. I'd rather take the kids to the library or the park.

Anyhow.... I agreed to go because I needed something from Babys-R-us. But first we went to the mall. I loaded the kids in the double stroller and gave the almost 3 yr old Banimal the "mommy's expectations about your behavior" talk and then we entered the labyrinth of insanity.

First of all.... they need a bigger mall. The stores had merchandise stuck in every conceivable hole in the joint. Just tons and tons of junk. Lots of stuff stuck in the isles. You know the kind of cheap stuff that looks kind of neat that you get that kind of hard to shop for person.

The people were a whole nother story. Women carrying more than their body weight in Dillard's bags. People making their kids get out of the stroller to put bags into the stroller. And there was so much plastic flying at the registers. The credit card companies are going to have another great year.

We spent most of our time following my material crazed mother around as she looked for the 'perfect gift' for everyone down to the preacher's first cousins' sister in law. But the kids enjoyed it. They like all the lights and the Christmas trees. I don't get them out much so its a new adventure when we do the mall. About half way thru the trip, as a surprise to the Banimal, I whipped out what we affectionately call "the Leash." He was happy. I wait until he is figgety and then I let him walk around kind of as a treat. Aren't I terrible?

Oh yeah... and for the icing on the cake three layers thick.... he got to ride a train in the mall, meet Ol Kris Kringle himself (although we opted out on the pic... they wanted nearly $15 for a mug with Santa), and Chick-fil-a was the the cherry on top. They had a man dressed up in a huge cow suit handing out free waffle fry cards. The Banimal was way more impressed with the cow dude.

Well... that was my mall excitement for the year. Hope its at least another year before I have to go back.