Get Your Shop On Black Friday Style!

Let's just start off by saying that Black Friday is awesome! It's just a crazy, madhouse, nutty kind of a day where you can spend $600.00 before the sun comes up! Our alarm clock went off at 3:30am Friday morning. My wife and I were on the road by 4:40am and we were at Toys R Us by 5:15am. The parking lot was full and it took several trips around the lot before I could find a parking space. There were no shopping carts to be found so I had to resort to standing by the exit and following someone to their car to get their cart. Once inside it was the usual insane free-for-all that we've come to expect as Black Friday veterans. I've got to hand it to Toys R Us - they've got all of their big sale items right in the front of the store in huge quantities, clearly marked and ready to go! We picked up a Sit `n' Spin for ten bucks, a Little Tykes tool bench for Tanner (also for $10.00) and a Deal or No Deal game for Elias. We grabbed a place in one of the looooooooooong lines and then took turns holding our place in line and looking through the store for other goodies. We ended up waiting in line for 55 minutes...all this at 6am in the morning!

From there we headed to Sears to nab a great price on the My First Craftsman Action and Sound Workbench, which we got the last one of! The Sears was connected to a mall so we hit up a few stores in the mall, knocking a major gift for Joey off the list. One of the cool things about Black Friday is being a crowded mall like a Saturday night but it's actually very early Friday morning. I snapped this picture of the mobbed food court at 8:20am! It is there that we took part of our new Black Friday tradition, Cheesesteaks at 8:30 in the morning. We paused for the same "breakfast" at the same time last year so I've now dubbed it a tradition.

From the mall we hit up Circuit City which was mad crazy! They had cops out front directing traffic. Inside, the store is shoulder to shoulder people. We pushed our way through and picked up several gifts at great prices. After Circuit City, we drove a little out of the way to go to a K-Mart in the middle of nowhere because they had advertised Herbie: Fully Loaded on Game Boy Advance for $7.00! That was going to be a little gift to myself, but they were all out. So it was on to Linens n' Things were Jen wanted to grab a few items including a Chocolate Fondue set ($15) for ourselves. Jen ran in and did the shopping while I grabbed a power nab in the car...and yes I did the thing where I wake up behind the wheel and think I'm driving and totally freak out!

After a pit stop for gas and Diet Pepsi, Target was next on the list. Target didn't really have anything great as part of their Black Friday sale but that didn't stop us from spending over $100.00 there! Target led to Macy's, which was also part of a mall so we had to hop into the mall for a bit. Leaving that mall, we drove a half hour back toward home and paid a visit to our local mall. KB Toys was all out of what we were looking for there, and that's understandable since it was going on 3:00pm at this point in the day! We were also out of luck at the Hallmark store looking for a couple of particular ornaments.

Our last stop was Kohl's...Man, I hate Kohl's! There is nothing for guys to look at in that store and there is no place to sit! But at Christmas time, they have all kinds of stuff in there so it wasn't too bad. They had Fisher Price toys 40% off, so we stocked up on some stuff for Tanner and Little People stuff for both the boys. They love those little guys!

We got home shortly before 5:00pm. A brisk 12 hours of shopping on one of the busiest shopping days of the year! Needless to say, we were pooped!


A New Era in Black Friday Shopping

You may have heard that some outlet malls opened at midnight Thanksgiving Night/Friday morning. Crazy? We thought it sounded like fun but decided to pass and just do the 5am thing. Well, it turned out to be a big success all over the country. Stores are reporting that between 12:00am and 5:00am they made as much money as they usually do ALL of Black Friday. I heard it referred to on CNN as "a whole new discovered day of holiday shopping!" Next year I bet you'll find everyone opens at midnight! It's going to be the new start of Black Friday!

For more, check out this article from the Boston Herald.