Let's go school shopping! Moms especially dread the coming of this season with a passion. It is the second most horribly financially draining time of the year next to Christmas.I took one of my daughters school shopping last night. I had every good intention of ONLY looking for great deals and sales since everything is so expensive. My daughter agreed that since we had time before school stared, we could afford to only buy what we thought was a good deal. With four teenagers, you would think I would have learned my lesson on impulse buying...Sure thing!
Shopping sickness here I come, since I couldn't think of a good excuse not to go. First stop, the Bean Barn, a local shop that sells a little everything and nothing whatsoever related to school shopping. I had driven past several times and saw the sign that said used horse tack. I have two horses and am always looking for a good deal on stuff of that nature. I spent $25.00 for a beautiful beaded headstall and reins. I really needed that since both of my horses are BOYS and I already have about 6 bridles for two horses. Won;t my special GUYS be surprised! Good thing they can't talk, but they will vertainly think their stupid owner has lost her mind.
Second stop, Payless Shoes. What girl can live without shoes? We did pretty good coming out spending about $40.00. My duaghter got a pair of neutral clogs and a great pair of American Eagle flats which they just recently started selling. In my opinion, this was a great move for Payless, and even the saleswoman admitted to higher sales since acquiring that line. The most expensive item was the pack of three really cute pairs of socks that they so cleverly hung on a rack right next to the register. You would not believe the draw power of cute socks to teenage girls! I really hate it when they do that!
By now of course we are hungry and even with suppertime looming, we couldn't walk by the pretzel place without stopping. Gotta hate that!
JC Penneys yielded a couple of good buys. We ended up with three cute shirts and a pair of jean shorts that were actually long enough for her to wear to school. Got out of there for under $30.00 (GOOD JOB!) P.S. I don't know what to make of the trend in girls shorts. There are barely enough scraps of fabric there to cover the necessities for most pairs you find in the stores unless you go into a capri style. Ridiculous!
Oh NO! Claire's! The bane of any parent's existence who has a teenage daughter. Mine has a strong headband fetish (even worse than her shoe fetish) so we had to walk out with 6 headbands, three pairs of earrings, 2 pens and 2 changepurses. The last two items being, once again, those handy little items that are (on sale of course) hanging right by the register. Man, I hate that!
We ended our school shopping trip with a trip to Regis to get hair cuts. I have a regular stylist who has become somewhat distracted by her small child during the last 5 or 6 of my haircuts and the cuts have become more and more alarming as I go along. This last one was a nightmare that happened only two weeks previously, so I was looking to get that straightened out. My daughter just wanted the split ends trimmed off of her beautiful naturally curly locks that come halway down her back. Well, the net result of that experience was a good haircut for me (YAY), but my daughter's stylist whacked off about six inches of her hair! She was crying and was so upset.
This is the saga of a school shopping trip. Have you learned anything at all?