Black Friday 2010

Thanksgiving was wonderful. Dinner turned out great. It was the first year that Loving Husband and I cooked the entire meal ourselves. Our turkey was tiny, since we only had 5 people to feed and the meal was delicious. We ate at 3 since our weather was quite burdensome, with even more snow falling that very morning - making roadways potentially prone to freezing again after sundown. We enjoyed a good meal, a good time with Pop Pop and Gran, and a warm cozy fire. The grandparents left around 6pm and I headed to bed.

Bed?! Yes, I got ready and took a snooze - although I only ended up getting an hour once I finally settled into sleep. Why on earth would I go to sleep at 6pm? Well because I was planning on leaving the house at 9:30pm to go shopping. Yes Black 'Friday' shopping commenced at 10pm on Thursday night, at Toys R Us! My friends Vanessa and Rebecca, swung by at 9:30pm and we were off!

We arrived around 9:50 and got in a line that was an hour long to get into the building. Thankfully, it was dry and it had warmed up considerably. It was above freezing (a first all week!) and wasn't too bad. We grabbed some reusable bags and Rebecca got in line. In line?! Oh yes, in line. We tag teamed out and did our shopping in shifts so that we'd move forward in the line. No one seemed to mind because we were SO far back when we had all completed the shopping that it wasn't any fuss that the one place holder became three. We accomplished our mission at Toys R Us with an hour wait in line and then we headed out. As we were walking to the car I fell and slipped on some remaining ice and got my butt all wet. I was fine, I didn't go down hard, Vanessa helped break my fall by catching my arm, but sadly my 8+ month pregnant self was seated on the wet ground. It was a tad chilly.

That didn't stop me though, into the car and across the street we went to The Disney Store which was open and awaiting us when we arrived a little after 12:30. We got all our loot and got in line. This line was far more manageable, about 30 minutes of waiting and then we were off to get some Starbucks. We had some time to kill before Khols opened at 3am. We sat for about 30-40 minutes in Starbucks, which was MUCH needed for my pregnant feet! Consumed breakfast #1 and the headed to the Baby Gap which was having a 50% off the entire store until 10am. I got some good deals for Mae and Ace and only spent $20. Then we were off to Khol's.

I personally didn't need anything at Khol's so I found myself a spot in a massage chair and sat there for 30-40 minutes while the other two shopped and stood in an impressive line. They continued to stand in line and I walked over at 3:50am and got in line to wait to get into Target. It was raining minimally on us in line, but it didn't soak me. I was inside by 4:05 - and beelined for the $3 appliances... sadly I zigged when I should have zagged and they were all gone by the time I arrived at where they were located. I did however manage to get ever other door buster deal that I had been seeking and got myself in line by 4:50am. Which apparently was confusing for some others and there were several rouge lines forming throughout the store. This caused for a severe traffic jam and gridlock that lasted 30 minutes with minimal movement. Vanessa and Rebecca joined me sometime within that gridlock. Once they got the line sorted out properly it moved much faster and within 40 minutes we were checked out.

Next up was breakfast #2 through McDonald's drive thru. That hit the spot... although in my attempt to be healthy I forgot all about that oj = heartburn issue that Mae's been blessing me with lately - so that made for a tad more difficulty while shopping. Fred Meyer was our final stop on the schedule. I got Ace some socks, but no other deals were screaming my name... only my feet were screaming. We all wrapped up our shopping and we headed out and I arrived home at 8am. 10 hours of shopping, 6 stores, 1.5 hours waiting outside, 3.5 hours waiting in checkout lines, and a lot of loot and tons of fun with two fabulous shoppers.

Of course upon my return home, my little man was just waking up and stirring... he came gave me a hug and Loving Husband happily took him downstairs and allowed me to sleep for 90 minutes - after that the two of them greeted me with an english muffin. Breakfast #3! and then Loving Husband headed out to the shed to procure Christmas. :) The tree went up, the first ornament went on, and LH headed out to do some Black Friday shopping of his own. Although within the hour he was over it after having just arrived at Khols and seeing the line. haha. He said 'turns out I don't have the stomach for this.' I took another 2 hour nap while Ace was asleep, but otherwise I'm running on Christmas cheer rather than sleep today. My legs and feet are ANGRY and I hope I can move at all tomorrow. However it was all worth the fun!