5am CRAZIES!!!

That would be me and my sister, Joanna. We are CRAZY! We spend hours viewing the "Black Friday" sales ads, make lists after lists of items we want, re-view the ads, re-make our lists...we do this EVERY YEAR. Our first year of Black Friday shopping (2001) was the most fun: Carly joined us and we three girls convinced Jed to join us as our driver (of the Mazda Protege') and we sped through Provo/Orem picking up things left & right.

This year Jo & I focused on Shopko's 5am sale. Jo picked me up at 4am and we waited in line outside Shopko's doors for an hour, making our game-plan and listing who was going to get what. Shopko was so well organized: they had a map of the store showing where the big-ticket items were located, and had several employees with scanners for price checks (they carried RED balloons with them so they were easy to spot). They had someone guiding the customers through the waiting line for check-out and EVERY register was open. They even had complimentary hot chocolate for us while we waited outside for the store to open.

5am sounded and we flew into the store, JoJo headed back to the toys and I headed to kitchen items. We were done in 15 minutes! We took our shopping carts to the car, unloaded them, and then returned to the store for more. CRAZY!!!

We met up with our sis-in-law, Pam, at Toys'r'us at 5:45am. She ventured to Walmart for her items and said it was a MAD HOUSE!!! The police were called in because people were fighting over electronics!! And, Pam (who is a buck 20) was almost squished to death from the crowd of mad, crazy people.

Toys'r'us was INSANE! I stood in line while Jo & Pam shopped. The line fed through all the isles of the store! I left Jo & Pam in line at 6:50am , and took off to go to Walgreen's (love that store) for some more shopping. I finished at Walgreens just as Jo & Pam were checking out at Toys'r'us. We had to stash the Toys'r'us purchases in Pam's van b/c Jo's van was full! We ate breakfast at Village Inn (at 7:40am), said goodbye to Pam, and headed back to Shopko. Yes, WE ARE CRAZY! Actually, we returned several of the items that we bought (we were in the "SALE" mode and got caught up in the excitement) and saved ourselves (and our husbands) about $200. Nice. Can't wait until next year to do this all over again!!!!