Black Friday - 2011

Another year is here and I have conquered another Black Friday  Thursday.   Yes around 10:30pm Vanessa, Mae, and I ventured out.   Yes due to the late -middle of the night- hours that I was going to be gone.  Mae had to join us on our adventure.  Seem backwards?  Perhaps in most families, but my child at 10.5 months does NOT sleep through the night and we figured only doom would come if she woke in the middle of the night to find her food source decidedly absent!   So she joined us.

We headed out to Toys R Us first, with the primary mission to obtain Mae's Christmas present - one of those little foam chairs that they have for 50% off on Black Friday.   TRU had been open since 9pm and we had to wait outside for about 15-20 minutes to allow for other people to leave the store, because of course they were at max capacity inside.  Mae was wide awake and happily cuddled against me in the Ergo, wondering what was going on!  We get inside and were on the hunt for the chair to make sure we grabbed them, mostly concerned they'd been to complicated to grab if we had other stuff.   Glad we went that route first because upon finding the chairs - I was sadly disappointed in their quality this holiday season.  2010 models were GREAT, Ace got one last year and it's of good quality and holding up well.  This year they were super cheap!   I passed.   Vanessa went looking for the one thing that was a "worth it" item and came up with nothing and so we looked at the rest of our lists, assessed the mad line and said "let's bail!"  

Our next stops were Baby Gap and The Disney Store.   Sadly Baby Gap's sales weren't as great as last year (50% off the whole store) but I still was able to snag a few deals and was the first people in line, so no waiting.  Next we headed over to the Disney Store and acquired all the good loot that was on our lists.   Mae was still wide awake and taking it all in.   We finished up and headed out.   We were done by 1am. 

Myself not having had a huge stuffing of a meal, requested a stop at the drive thru for a 'midnight' snack and then we headed home.    Vanessa and I chatted in the driveway for nearly an hour - with M sleeping cozy in the back.   I went in and M and I went to sleep until a little after 9am.    I then quickly got dressed, leaving Mae with her dad and brother and went to Fred Meyer to get their 50% off socks!   All in all it was a successful and far more muted out as compared to our all nighter last year.

Upon coming home - one would have bet that it was time to deck the halls of our house in festive merriment - but honestly I just wasn't feeling it.   I had no desire to set up the tree, I was just kind of in a funk.   I finally pulled myself out of it by Sunday and on Sunday evening we set up the tree and placed the first ornament on the tree as a family.  And we kicked off the holidays and Morgan's first Christmas season!