14 posts tagged “shopping”

Today after church I went to Old Navy because my kids needed some summer clothes.  (They just keep outgrowing their stuff, darn it.)  Bailey and I walked in, grabbed a cart, arranged our purses inside the child seat part, and began to look at the girls' shorts.  This employee kid walked up to me with a handful of those mesh shopping bags in his hand.  He held one out to me and asked me, in all sincerity, "How are you doing today?"  [Just fine, thanks.]  "Are you finding everything ok so far?" [Yes, I am.]  "Do you need a bag to hold your stuff...or are you ok with the cart?"  [I'm good, thanks.]

I must've looked pretty wealthy in my church clothes (which consisted of a dress I got for $6 at Target + accessories) if he thought that I'd be filling my cart to overflowing and need a shopping bag as well.  Either that or he was just convinced that I would get tired of that pesky cart.  It was all I could do to not laugh out loud.  Poor kid - he was probably told to go around asking customers if they needed a handy shopping bag....but shouldn't independent thinking factor in here somewhere?  :)

This was going to be a "Me and My Monday" post but then I realized that I'm not in the picture I took.  Duh.  And I have no other ideas.  So instead I'll just show the picture:

If you can't tell, this is my Outlook calendar.  And look!  It's telling you that I have four days of vacation starting tomorrow!  There will be plenty of homework being done, but there will be fun stuff too - like a designated shopping morning (I'm not sure which day yet but it will be just me, maybe a friend of mine...but more importantly, no husband or kids that I'll have to listen to whine.  Can we go home?  I'm tired!  I'm hungry!  Aren't you done yet?  Just pick something!  Why do you have to try it on?  Try it on at home!  Whine, whine, whine.

We're also going to a baseball game on Wednesday.  Minor league - very minor league - but still fun.  It's Blood Donor night so I got us some free tickets.  Can't beat that!

Right now, though, I think I need to get a good night's sleep.  Can't have a great week off if I'm tired!  Later.

When I was in Savannah a couple of months ago, I forgot my sunglasses and bought a new pair.  Since I didn't need two pair that turned out to be basically identical, I gave my old ones to Bailey.  So Joey wanted some too.  He hasn't had any sunglasses since he lost his Hot Wheels ones at the race in Indianapolis two summers ago.  So we were at the store the other day and I asked him if he wanted to look for some.  He walked over to the display and first picked out a pair of "Cars" ones.  I talked him out of those because they looked too small.  I pointed out a rack of Transformers ones.  He immediately picked out a pair and put them on.

Notice the cool Borg-like eye thing:

I tried to talk him into a more normal pair, but he said:

"No, Mom, I need a pair that fits my lifestyle!"

Alrighty, then.  I'm not sure if he's fighting crime when I'm not looking or what, but whatever.  :)

I love my boy.

 

It's not often that I actually do something worth writing about on a weekend, so when I do it's definitely getting a blog entry. 

We had a nice family weekend.  On Friday I took a half day since it was the last day of Spring Break for Brian and the kids.  We went up to the Twin Cities for the afternoon.  We'd debated museums and zoos, but in the end decided to save those endeavors for warmer weather and to take the kids to Nickelodeon Universe at the Mall of America instead.  Plus, that's what they chose. 

It's about 50 miles from here to the southern edge of the Cities, and about halfway lies a town named Cannon Falls.  Since this was a day meant for fun, we decided to stop at the Cannon River Winery, located in a renovated downtown building.  We got to taste three wines each, and ended up buying two.  They also let us wander around their tasting room/dining room/winemaking area.

 

 

 

 

 

After that stop, we proceeded along US 52 to St. Paul, from whence we commenced travel on Interstate 494 to St. Louis Park, a Minneapolis suburb.  Our next stop was a place we've been wanting to visit for quite some time, not only for the cheap wine but also because we thought they would have some fun, SBD-friendly items:

 

We found some fun trail mixes and whole grain pastas, not to mention some chip/snack options for those days when you just need something.  I was disappointed that most of their sauces and salad dressings contained a lot of sugar.  I thought for a store that seems to stress "natural" and "organic" and "healthy" items there would be less sugar.  Oh well.  It was fun anyway.

So from Trader Joe's it was back down to Bloomington: next stop Ikea!  Such a fun store.  You can get a lot of stuff there for cheap.  I've only bought little things like towels and gadgets there.  I haven't bought furniture there - most of it is too contemporary for my taste, but I always like to look.

I got that cast iron skillet for 8 bucks!  And a set of 6 little wine glasses for 3 bucks.  We wanted some smaller ones for diet (read: portion control) issues.  Joey could've gone to the kids' area.........

.....but decided to stay with the rest of us.

Overall, they were very patient because they knew that after Ikea would be the rides!

Nickelodeon Universe is an indoor amusement park that's located smack in the middle of the Mall of America.  Once upon a time it was known as Camp Snoopy and had a cute Peanuts-woodsy-camp feeling to it.  Now it's true Nick.

 

 

 

 

The kids had to choose their rides carefully because we are mean parents and refused to spend unlimited amounts of money on overpriced rides.  They chose the Farily Odd Coaster first.

 

 

Then they were on to their next ride.

 

 

After that it was time for supper.  The kids wanted to go to the Rainforest Cafe, but when we got there and saw the line of people waiting for a table, we quickly decided to implement Plan 2.  Only we didn't know what Plan 2 was.  We had passed a little walk-up fast food place that boasted of healthy food so we went there.  Brian and I were able to get something that was fairly SBD-friendly, and even the kids found something they could/would eat.  After that Brian took the kids back to Nick Universe for one more ride while I went up to the third floor to check out my favorite store, Nordstrom Rack.  This is Nordstrom's outlet store and it is wonderful!  Normally I can find at least 5 great pair of shoes when I go there (unfortunately I don't buy 5 great pair) but this time despite 6 aisles of size 10 shoes there wasn't really anything that really struck me.  I did, however, find two awesome skirts and a sweater, all for 60% off the lowest marked price (who needs rides when you can get bargains like that!).  Before I was done there, Brian and the kids showed up.  The kids were exhausted and more than ready to go home.  I paid my bill and we hit the road.  It was a fun day.

On Saturday we were out and about running errands.  We decided that since we were in the winery-visiting mode, we would take in a local one that just opened this year.  It really felt like a start-up place.  The guy's tasting room was in his garage.  It had been fixed up and was quite clean so it wasn't gross or anything, just not what you'd usually expect.  I wonder if he'll build a "real" tasting room after he becomes a little more established.  His wines were good, though.  We bought a white grape wine (Edelweiss, a hardy grape hybridized for wine and the ability to survive northern climates) and a rhubarb wine.  He showed us his vats and told us one or two things about the winemaking process that we didn't know - something we might be able to try at home.

Today was a really thought-provoking church service.  Tonight we were supposed to have our small group Bible study.  There are four couples and right now we're watching a DVD series called The Truth Project.  One couple said this morning that they wouldn't be able to make it, then another couple decided later in the afternoon that they wouldn't make it either.  They just got home from vacation so I'm sure were exhausted.  So that left us and the couple that was hosting it tonight.  Their kids are about the same ages as ours so they told us to bring the kids and we'd watch the DVD anyway.  When we got there, one of the kids opened the case....and the DVD was gone!  It must have still been at one of the other couples' houses.  So we just hung out and had dessert while the kids played.  It was a nice time.

And now, it's bedtime!  Good night.

New Shoes

I got these for $6.60 in the shoe room at Herberger's.  How much does that rock?

They hurt a little bit on Monday when I wore them for the first time, but whaddya gonna do?  They'll stretch.  I'm going to need surgery someday because I will have destroyed my feet from wearing high heels all the time.  The problem is, though, that most "comfortable" shoes look like they should be worn by my grandma.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

New TV

Brian surprised me with this on Tuesday night, after telling me we weren't going to get one, after telling me for months that we'd get one with our tax return.  He claims he did that on purpose; I think he changed his mind when I got mad at him.

It's a 46" LCD HDTV.  We don't have HD yet, maybe later.  Just for now it's fun to have it be big.  This TV replaces one that's about 30", and that one was taken upstairs to our bedroom to replace the 19" one that died (which is how this all started).  The new/old one looks pretty ginormous in our bedroom:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

New Number on the Scale

I'm happy to report that after 8 days on SBD, I've lost six pounds.  Brian's lost 11.  I have yet to see the weight loss in the mirror, but for now the number on the scale helps keep me motivated. 

• I hate Wal-Mart.  We just spent an hour there shopping for groceries and other miscellaneous necessities.  I despise that store, and it was especially bad today since it was more crowded than usual.  I suppose everyone's coming out of the woodwork since the temp broke zero today.  (It's a whole 9 degrees.)  Wal-Mart was like it is on a Saturday, and that's the very reason I avoid Wal-Mart on Saturday like the plague.  It's crowded, and you can't look at anything, or look for anything, without someone needing to get by you.  Every time you turn around someone's there, and it's just aggravating.  I don't like crowds.  Add that to my kids underfoot and Brian thinking we have to only buy stuff on the list (even though there's only 8 things on the list, yet this is our weekly grocery shopping), and well, we all get crabby.
• This week I thought about applying for a new job.  It was a placement coordinator for the Department of Laboratory Medicine & Pathology.  Basically, I'd help recruit people, and I'd screen applicants and help place new hires into the lab that fits their skills & interests best.  Sounds fun, huh?  I emailed the HR contact and found out that this job is in the same pay category that I'm already in.  I've got enough going on right now that I'd only take a new job if there was a pay raise involved.  I have enough frustrations with my current job to think that there might be something better out there, but not enough that I'm going to make a lateral move right now.
• I'm supposed to take a test this week.  I'm trying to study but I just cannot concentrate.  I'm very slowly learning what I need to know, but there are just more interesting things to do.  I think the combination of getting a B in micro and the fact that I've cut back on caffeine have made me mellow (Mello?) enough that I'm kind of unmotivated.  I'm glad I like this class....if I didn't I'd really be in bad shape.
• I was working on a bulletin board this week at church and I had a thought.  I've always been somewhat bothered by the fact that I don't have a talent.  I can do a lot of things at an acceptable level, but I've never had anything that I'm really good at.  And I always felt like without a talent I don't have a purpose.  But then it dawned on me: maybe that IS my purpose - to be a jack-of-all-trades.  There are those people that have one thing they can do in a church, and that's their standby, year after year, and that's necessary and great.  But one thing I can do is fit in wherever I'm needed.  Well, almost - I don't do anything financial or otherwise businesslike.  I help with music regularly, I've done multiple things with VBS (music, food, drama, crafts), I've taught Sunday School, I'm working with a group to update the kitchen, and I've painted walls.  Our church is very small so I'm glad I can help out in a lot of different areas.  Still, I wish I had a talent.
• Fetzer Sauvignon Blanc is a good bottle of wine for less than five bucks.
• I need to learn to watch my mouth.  A couple of times this week now I've said things that I've since obsessed over whether or not they were taken the wrong way.  I used to be a quiet person - I should probably try to get back to that state.  The less I say, the less likely I'll say something inadvertently rude.

Allright, back to studying.  Brian and I haven't eaten supper yet so in a bit I'm going to make an artichoke dip.  It's baked and we spread it on sliced, lightly toasted French bread.  Brain food.

This year seems to have brought on the usual barrage of trees, lights, ornaments, treats, Santas, and presents.  Nothing unusual or out-of-the-ordinary.  But what's really gotten my attention this year is how all of a sudden Christmas doesn't exist anymore.  Everywhere you go, it's "Happy Holidays" and "Seasons Greetings" - which is all well & good - but "Merry Christmas" or even "Happy Hanukkah" is nowhere to be found.  And yes, I know that Hanukkah fell early this year and is over, but even before it started you didn't hear anything about it. All we've been allowed to hear this year in the marketplace is a sanitized version of some nebulous "holiday" that can't really be defined.

If I wish someone Merry Christmas, I risk the ACLU coming to my door and accusing me of not being inclusive.  I'm not trying to be exclusive, I'm just wishing someone Merry Christmas, just like I'd say Happy Thanksgiving...oh wait, that's offensive to Native Americans.  Happy St. Patrick's Day?  No, that portrays the Irish as green-beer-swilling drunks.  Happy Valentine's Day?  No, that might bother girls who don't have boyfriends.  (Can I even say "boyfriend" or do I have to say "significant other?")  Well, anyway, I'm not going to tell someone that they can't celebrate Kwanzaa or whatever their holiday of choice is, because I don't want anyone, including the ACLU, telling me that I can't celebrate Christmas.  I'm not saying that Christmas has to be the only thing being celebrated at the end of December - but I do think that I should have the freedom to celebrate it without having to go into hiding in order to do so.  We're all grown-ups here.  I'm not going to cry because I see someone lighting a menorah on public property.  Don't we have more important things to worry about?

I celebrate Christmas.  The birth of Jesus Christ.  The miracle of the virgin birth.  The hope of peace and eternal life in a world that, frankly, is crappy and decrepit.  Read the newspaper for five minutes and it's obvious how much people need a Savior.  This world needs a Savior!  And He came at Christmastime and I'm happy about it.  So I celebrate it.  I do all the traditional stuff but there needs to be a reason for celebrating.  If there's no Christ in Christmas, what are you celebrating?  A fat guy in a red suit who's not even real?  The opportunity to max out your credit cards and go into debt until March?  Peace on earth, goodwill toward men?  Nope - can't say that, it's from the Bible.  Silent Night, Holy Night?  Nope.  Bible again.  I really don't know.  Someone please enlighten me.

I guess the thing that really makes me shake my head is that if you go to the store or turn on the TV, all the Christmas stuff is there - the Santas, the trees, the red & green....it's all there except that the name has been changed from "Christmas" to "Holiday."  And I think that if I wasn't a Christian, I would laugh at all of this because the attempts to not offend me with the C Word are futile when everything around me screams Christmas.  I'd be offended that advertisers and retailers and the media must really think I'm stupid if the celebration of a holiday can all of a sudden be politically correct just because of the removal of one word.  If we really want to not offend Jews or Muslims or Wiccans or whoever, we need to get rid of everything that suggests Christmas, not just one word.  I mean, I know that the root word CHRIST might make some people's ears burn but the implication is still there even if we remove that oh-so-offensive word Christmas.

So yeah, that's what I've been thinking about today.

Boy, lemme tell ya, I LIKE not having to do homework all day!  Or maybe more accurately, to not have it hanging over my head all day while I think about how I should be doing it!

I didn't quite get my 12 hours of sleep last night, but I did get 11, which is just as good.  I woke up at 8:30 this morning, with a gradual onset of consciousness that was not in the form of an alarm clock.  I feel like a new person.  I got up, made coffee, cleaned up my kitchen (just a little; Brian had done most of it prior), had some peppermint coffee, did some residual homework (but it wasn't bad because I wasn't sitting in a chair trying in vain to memorize biochemical reactions), caught up on some of my neighbors' blogs, had lunch, and BAKED!  I haven't baked in what feels like decades.  I made banana bread with chocolate chips and mini cheesecakes.  We're hosting our small group Bible study tomorrow night so I had to make something somewhat fun & cute & Christmas-y.  They don't look great (I'm definitely out of practice) but I did take it upon myself to do some quality control and I think we'll be all right.  Oh yeah, and I made a real supper too.

We also watched the Bourne Supremacy this afternoon and the Bourne Ultimatum after the kids were in bed.  I was only about half-watching the last one since Brian had me wrapping Christmas presents.  Which was fine; it wasn't like he was ordering me to, but he wanted it done.  I'm not really sure why it needed to be done today, actually, but it's taken care of now except that I need a little gift bag for the present I got for my cleaning girl, and we (I) decided to separate one of Bailey's presents into two, which means that we need to get one more for Joey.  We also need a couple more stocking stuffers for each of them.  We'll take care of that on Tuesday when we do our weekly shopping during Awana.  (No-kid shopping is the only way to do it.  Shopping with kids is tortuous even when they're 7 and 9....and mine don't even beg for stuff.  They just complain that they want to go home and lollygag behind, but that's bad enough.)

I'm so glad to be "on break!"

I have been looking and looking for a shawl to wear with the dress I've picked out for our church's Christmas dinner.  I was absolutely amazed at how difficult it is to find something to wear around your arms.  I guess they just aren't that popular, although they really can be an elegant look.  So my outfit consists of a long black tank dress (courtesy of my sister handing down her fat clothes), a long necklace and big, dangly earrings made of red "jewels," and the shawl I FINALLY found yesterday. 

I'd literally looked everywhere in town.  I finally found it at Dress Barn.  I wouldn't normally think to go to a place called Dress Barn when looking for clothes....it just sounds so dowdy.  But they actually had a lot of things that I saw that were quite cute, and reasonably priced too.  Some of it was worthy of the store name, but some was fairly classy.  After finding very few shawls at any stores, and zero that cost under $60 (not gonna spend that for something I'll rarely wear), DB had many styles to choose from.  I actually had to make a decision about which one to get, whereas I'd kind of come to the conclusion that I was going to have to take the first thing I found that even remotely resembled what I had in mind.  What I got was a wrap in a solid black rayon.  So it has that sheen that makes it look dressy, yet it'll still keep my arms warm (it is December in Minnesota, after all).  At the ends it has black beaded fringes which are the perfect touch, and look great with my jewelry.  It weighs a ton.  I wish I could get some shoes too, but being as this is also the season for Christmas shopping, and Brian's been pretty patient with me about this whole accessory-search, I think I'd better just know when to quit.  I do have some black wedge-heel sandals I can wear, and while they're not perfect, they'll do.

After all this, I think I'm going to look great.  My only concern now is that I'm going to be overdressed.  The invitation said to wear black, white, red, or green, and NO jeans, but I'm wondering if that'll only serve to nudge people up to khakis and a sweater.  I'm going to ask around tomorrow at church and try to convince my friends who aren't planning to dress up, to do it!  I never get to dress up - I'm looking for an excuse - but I also don't want to look pretentious.  I'm telling Brian that he must wear a shirt & tie at a minimum (his only suitjacket is navy, otherwise he'd be wearing that too).  He's real thrilled about that.  This is a guy who thinks if he wears jeans and a button-down shirt as opposed to a T-shirt, he's dressed up.  Twelve years and I have yet to dispel that error in judgement, but we're working on it.

This is where I have been for the last 1.5 days.  I'm staying at the Holiday Inn Express in Bloomington, MN.  My hotel has a lovely view of I-494 and the MSP airport - specifically, the Northwest hangar.  Last night there was a tornado warning that came through right around the time we were going to leave for supper.  I can't say as I've ever had the interesting experience of being on the 10th floor with sirens going off.  The hotel shuttle wouldn't even go for a while; eventually we just drove to supper ourselves.

This hotel has less-than-average housekeeping service.  I will say that my room has always been clean, and I haven't found hair in the sheets or anything, so that's good.  However, when I got here Wednesday night there was no toilet paper in my room.  Two rolls and both were empty.  By the time I got into my room and started to settle in it was already 10:00 so I figured ok, I'll just use Kleenex and suffer through (sorry, hope that wasn't TMI) until they come and service my room on Thursday.  On Thursday, they did come and left me some toilet paper, so I was glad to see that.  However, they didn't leave me any conditioner.  Normally I always bring my own shampoo & conditioner, but now that I have short hair that behaves a little better I figured I'd save space in my bag and just use the stuff in the room.  And that, of course, would be the time that they don't leave me more conditioner after I needed the entire little bottle on Thursday morning.  So I called down to the desk and they brought me three bottles.  Um, ok, I didn't need that much, but thanks.  Then when I got back into my room after supper I noticed that not only had the coffee maker not been rinsed out (even the cheap hotels will do that for you), but they didn't leave me a new thing of coffee.  I thought about trying to make do without coffee the next morning, but then I decided that no, it would never do for me to try to get through a morning without coffee.  It just wouldn't.  So I called the front desk - AGAIN - and asked for coffee.  Brother.  This room costs $185 a night.  Even though I'm not paying for it I think the service should be a little better than this!!   I hate to be high-maintenance, but some things you just can't do without.  Let's just say I'm not impressed.  

Last night was supposed to be the Speaker Supper - the MnABB board always takes the speakers out for a nice dinner.  Strangely, this year none of the speakers came.  Not one.  So it was 8 of the 10 board members at this restaurant.  The meal was going to be paid for either way, so we took advantage.  The restaurant was at the Mall of America and it was called the Twin City Grill - I highly recommend it if you find yourself at the MOA anytime in the future.  I was also ecstatic to find one of my new favorite wines on the wine list (Pedroncelli "Mother Clone" Old Vine Zin - we tasted it out in Sonoma).  After supper we walked over to Nordstrom Rack (the Nordstrom's outlet store) and I didn't buy anything.  But not for lack of finding anythinhg - I found some incredible Kenneth Cole Reaction black leather pumps, and some great jewelry.  Unfortunately, though, any & all extra monies are going to have to be used to replace our computer at home, which was in the process of blowing up as I talked to my husband last night (right after we got diverted off the shuttle bus because of the weather).  So I did call him from Norstrom Rack to let him know that for once I exercised some self-control and did not buy anything.  His lack of enthusiasm about it was less-than-rewarding for me, especially given the fact that I will be feeling the pain of not buying those pumps for a long time.

Oh yeah, I'm here for a meeting too.  I've mentioned before that I have an aversion to meetings, and to sitting in one place for long periods of time, so I didn't attend most of the actual lectures yesterday (except one which was given by a work friend of mine and she'd asked for moral support).  I worked the registration table yesterday and today I'll be in charge of the vendors.  That should be kind of fun - vendors always have cool stuff.  I could use some more Post It notes for my kitchen so hopefully someone will have a stack.

I'm actually kind of having a good time.  It's fun to be treated as if you actually know something.  I'm being allowed to make decisions and everything - I'm loving it!  I'm no powermonger or control freak, but I do get sick of being questioned at every turn at work.  Either there's a complete lack of trust among coworkers where I work or else I'm a complete moron who needs to be questioned.  I guess I'll never know for sure but like I said, I am really enjoying myself here.

Today the meeting goes from 8-4 and then we get to go home.  I'm only an hour away from home so I'll be home in time to see my kids before they go to bed, which will be nice, especially since I'm sure Brian's ready for a break.  He probably deserves Pizza Hut delivery.