shopping

Buyer’s Remorse?

Rule #1–When you go in for a minor surgical procedure, and they specifically tell you not to make any important decisions for the next 24 hours, this does include shopping online. Specifically, it includes ordering a dress from Macy’s that you really can’t afford when you’re sleepless thanks to aforementioned surgical procedure, and the events leading up to it. So, no decisions, no shopping.

Rule #2–For the love of heaven, when said dress arrives, do not try it on! Probably don’t even open the box–just take the whole thing immediately back to Macy’s and return as quickly as possible.

Rule #3–If you have ignored rule #2, (shame on you!), and insisted on trying it on, do not, I repeat, do not, model it for any members of your family. Especially not little girls who love dresses, or over-complimentary husbands and sons.

Rule #4–Do not venture down the road of what I like to call “Amanda Math,” trying to justify how you might keep the dress. Pack it back in the box, and return it to Macy’s as quickly as possible (as was previously suggested in rule #2).

Rule #5–Maybe just block the Macy’s website from your computer.

Rule #6–If you have the will power to actually make it to Macy’s with the dress for the return, don’t look around. You’ll just find yourself back at the beginning of a vicious cycle!

The Seventy Dollar Bill

I had to stop by the grocery store this morning. Just a quick trip–I needed some cinnamon chips to bake blondies. So I grab my one item and get in the express lane. I’m not really paying attention to the guy in front of me, but I notice the cashier handing him his money back, so I look closer, and in his hand is a bill that looks like normal money, but it has *70* printed on it. Total double take situation, because I couldn’t believe what I was seeing.

The guy tried to pass it off as a joke, but I’m fairly sure he was trying to con this poor cashier. For starters, when he dug in his pocket to get his “real” money, he couldn’t come up with enough to pay for his 20 ounce drink. He was eight cents short, and actually had the nerve to yell at *me* when I told him I didn’t have any cash (whether or not what I told him was true is irrelevant!).

The cashier seemed pretty young and naive, and didn’t call for her manager or the cops (which I sure would have). Based on my few years in retail (and I certainly never saw a “$70”), I’m guessing he hoped she was stupid enough to fall for it, and then he would get back $68 plus change of actual money, instead of his fake bill. He was really quite belligerent after that, so things obviously did not go according to plan.

I wonder how many other stores he tried to con today. If I see anything in the newspaper about it later, I’ll know who it was!

The Family Shopping Experience

We were on our way to Wal-Mart last night to do our grocery shopping.  And, yes, by “we” I mean all six of us. And it got me to thinking how we used to shop, and how we never figured we’d be taking all four children shopping with us on a regular basis (certainly not to the madhouse that is Wal-Mart!).  

Back when we were first married, Ryan and I used to always do our grocery shopping together.  Not sure how that started, but it was fun, and something we looked forward to.  Maybe we were just newlyweds who loved spending time together, or maybe we both just loved the novelty that was choosing our own food for our own meals, but every week, we went together (and I can’t believe how little we used to spend, and what amount used to seem like a lot to me!).

So, when Turkey was born, we just brought him along, too.  And then when Bunny arrived, we just got a second cart, and brought her, as well. We figured at some point, when she was bigger, we’d have to stop the whole family shopping experience, but we really didn’t, and when Moose and then Ladybug joined us, they came along, too.  

We still only need two carts (and that’s as much because of how many groceries a family of six needs as it is for the seating of the three littler ones), and that day of having to “stop” shopping as a family has never come. Sure, we’ve had days where little people are crabby, and I needed to just go by myself, or the occasional day where grocery shopping just couldn’t happen when they were awake, so, again, off I went alone, but usually we go together, and it’s something we all look forward to.  We’re just weird that way.

Finally!

I have placed my first order with Sonlight! For now, I decided to go with the P 4/5 core, with the K readers and language arts, and K handwriting. I also added Get Ready, Set, Go for the Code from Sonlight, and some extra chapter books and a classical music CD from Amazon. I’ll decide within the next few weeks whether or not I’m going to go ahead and order the K materials as well, to supplement what I ordered tonight, but I wanted to order the stuff I knew I’d be using right away, so I can work on getting our classroom organized.

Some of the books I’m most looking forward to reading with Turkey and Bunny (and Moose and Ladybug, if they want to listen in) are A Family Treasury of LIttle Golden Books (there must be stories in there I remember from my childhood!), The Complete Adventures of Peter Rabbit, The Milly-Molly-Mandy Storybook, Usborne Stories from Around the World, the Children’s Book of Virtues, Family-Time Bible in Pictures, Then & Now, The Berenstain Bears’ Big Book of Science and Nature, and The Year at Maple Hill Farm. This is only a small sampling of the books we’ll be reading together in the coming months, but they’re the ones I’m most excited about, whether from reading them myself as a child, or from the way the descriptions in the catalog made them sound!

I don’t know who is more excited about our school year–me or the children. Turkey told me today that he wants to start school in three days! That’s obviously not going to happen, as I’m not ready for it yet, (I have some other shopping left–have to hit the parent-teacher supply store, Target and/or Wal-Mart and CPH, not to mention rearranging and setting up the guest bedroom/classroom) but I don’t know that we’ll make it to my original plan of Labor Day week. At the least, we’ll be doing a special unit that I’m putting together about the Olympics and China, which should be tons of fun. I’m really looking forward to this new adventure that we’re about to embark on together!

Seven is the New Ten is the New Sixty!

It used to be that 60 years of marriage was considered the diamond anniversary. Then, the “modern” list of anniversary gifts came out, and all of the sudden, 10 years is a diamond year. That’s quite a jump, from 60 down to 10! Of course, the modern list has diamonds for several anniversaries, and any number of gemstones and luxury items where they didn’t used to be (gone are the days of paper, cotton and leather–now it’s clocks, china and crystal!), but even so, cutting off the wait time by 50 years seems extreme.

It does make one wonder at the change. Is it because our society is so impatient, and so used to instant gratification that we can’t stand to wait until we’ve been married for 60 years? Is it because, even though life expectancies are longer, people are marrying later in life, thus making it less likely that they’ll be married for 60 years or longer? Or is simply that, with the divorce rate what it is, people want to get what they can while the getting is good? Any and/or all of these seems to me to be a viable possibility.

At any rate, even though we’re only celebrating our seventh anniversary this year, my wonderful husband got me a beautiful anniversary ring. Now, I’m a fairly patient sort of person, so it really wasn’t a matter of not being able to wait until our tenth (or sixtieth, I suppose) anniversary. And we got married young enough, so that’s not a problem. I’m also damn sure we won’t be getting a divorce, so it wasn’t a matter of doing the ring thing now, because we might not be together in a few years.

No, it was simple math. Thanks to Uncle Sam, and the economic stimulus package, we had the money now. With four children, we are fully aware that we may not have the money in three, thirteen or even thirty years, but here’s the government, giving us blow money, which is our civic duty to spend to try and help the economy limp along. So, good stewards of our money that we are (most of the time) we rendered unto Caesar what is Caesar’s, and did some shopping, not the least of which is my new ring. I am very grateful for my new pretty, and while I would have been willing to wait until whatever anniversary was deemed appropriate to receive diamonds, I’m glad I didn’t have to!