50% Off Clearance Toys at KMart

Yesterday I spent most of the day in Minot.  My sister and I went straight from dropping Elliott off at school to a dealership in Minot so she could get a new car after her engine went out last week.  While we were waiting for finance approval we decided to do a little bit of Christmas shopping.  At Target we found a few things in the stationary department on clearance, but not much that we needed.  I bought a few scrapbooking stickers and one activity book for Elliott for Christmas (it was the Amazing SpiderMan and was half price).

After we got a call back saying they were ready for her to sign all the papers to pick up her new car, I decided it was already late enough in the day that I might as well not even go back home before going to pick Elliott up from school.  So we had lunch and then we headed to Kmart.  My sister works there, and had to be there about 15 minutes later anyway.  She mentioned that clearance toys were 50% off, which I hadn't even noticed in the ad.  So I went back to take a look.

I don't know about you guys, but it seems like Kmart is pretty hit or miss on clearance toy prices.  Yesterday they had a bunch!  Our Kmart has a pretty big section in the back for clearance, and most of the shelves were pretty well stocked!  I ended up buying things like Legos, Squinkies, and Barbies and got great deals on all of them.  I would post a picture of some of my favorite finds but my son would see and some of them are surprises. :)

This year seems to be shaping up to be pretty full of birthday parties.  He's already been invited to three, and another mom approached me the other day to ask if I could help chaperone a party at a pizza place for her son next month.  Last year there were four in February alone, so we haven't even hit the busy season!  I always let Elliott go to the parties if he wants to, so I definitely take advantage of big sales to get things that I know his friends are into at great prices.

We also use these sales to Christmas and birthday shop for Elliott and his cousins, as well as the children that we buy for at Christmas.  Yesterday I bought a big Squinkies amusement park toy (originally priced at almost $50, and I paid just over $20), several sets of Legos (orginally $14-38 each, I paid $6-15), and a few other things that need to remain a secret. :)

If you haven't already checked it out, I would encourage you to do so this week.  Also, even if your store has a clearance section for toys, check in the regular toy section as well, because sometimes they are mixed in, and you can score great deals where other people aren't looking.

What a Morning!

Today was one of those mornings where it felt like everything was going fine, and then suddenly it stopped!  We were up and around early enough, and Elliott even had time to sit at the table and eat his breakfast, as opposed to eating it on the way to school!  But then when I told him to find a jacket, there was meltdown, because he didn't actually hang any of them up yesterday when we were putting away laundry.  And then he couldn't find his backpack (which was actually right where it was supposed to be, only it was under the jacket that he couldn't find from Friday!).  And then I couldn't find the van keys!  Normally I would just grab to car keys and go anyway (there's a key to all three vehicles on both the keychains that have a remote attached), but today my husband was in the car, so my sister could use his truck, since her car bit the dust on Thursday.  It turns out she had grabbed my van keys because she wasn't paying any attention, and thought she had a different set of keys that has the key to the storage unit.  Luckily that unit is just about 2 blocks away, so when she got there and discovered she had the wrong keys, she was able to come back and hand them over before it made Elliott late for school.  I was still pretty irritated, though, since we were tearing the room apart and I had already called my husband at work, figuring he had taken my keys along with his (which has happened more times than he would probably admit to).

Anyway, I got Elliott to school on time.  His school encourages the children to play outside assuming it's not raining or snowing, or colder than like -20 or something.  So normally we get there about 20 minutes before school starts so he can play outside with his friends that ride the bus.  Today we were only about 10 minutes early, but his best friend had missed the bus and was pulling up just after us anyway, so it worked out!  Apparently it was a rough morning everywhere!