Today is “Black Friday” a day, as one blogger put it, “the American version of The Hunger Games but with sale items instead of food.”  Seems about right.  The thankfulness of yesterday turns into the commercialized feeding frenzy of today.

So, our plan today was to be up and on the road by 5:00 AM to get to Waterloo and shop there.  The only problem with this, a vet visit without an actual time, a basketball practice, and “movie night” with my daughter’s boyfriend and their friends.  *sigh*  So, my beautiful wife and I were out of the house by 7:30 in the morning to take on the crowds in Decorah, the nearest real shopping near us.

Now, in a nutshell, we had a pretty darn good day.  We found the real spendy, trendy jeans one daughter wanted in a thrift shop, we found that we could very easily upgrade the other daughter’s four year old phone without a gigantic hit to our budget, I got to eat at the local BBQ for for the first time (if you are in Decoarh, the Old Armory is awesome!), and we had a chance to just hang out together.  The crowds weren’t huge (Decorah’s not that big to begin with), kids around us were well behaved, the adults were well behaved (except when I started many of the talking Olaf dolls in the toy section), and the things we found were right on the lists we had.  Best of all, it was relaxing.

Our daughters have been pushing a lot of buttons lately and our home has been unusually tense as of late.  Being together like this, it just reminds me why we are together and why our children are the way they are.  They are smart, talented, opinionated, strong willed, quick witted, and most of all, loving.  I see so much of them in their mother it’s crazy.  She doesn’t know all the positives that she’s all ready imparted to them, even though they don’t always see eye to eye.  It’s nice to see my wife smile and laugh, I miss that.

So, my happy thought: Black Friday shopping! Didn’t think that could be a positive did you? 😉