Tuesday, November 25, 2008

It's the most Stressful Wonderful Time of the Year

How does this happen every year? How is it that I plan, VOW, from Dec 26, I will get my Christmas presents bought little by little over the year? And then, every year, it is suddenly the week of Thanksgiving and I realize that, CRAP! I haven't been buying presents!! I've been making mental lists of all of the cool things that I plan to get my loved ones for Christmas. And I have been mentally paring that list down as I realize that all those trips to all those out-of-town soccer games have left our finances a leeetle tighter than they were last year. Note to SugarPlum: Surprise! Your Christmas present is that you get to play soccer. That is the most freaking expensive present that anyone in our family is getting - by far.


I actually do have a couple of gifts already. There's the huge Lego set for the boys that I found on clearance at WalMart in July. The miracle there is that a) I remember, four months later, that I bought it; and b) that I remember, four months later, where I put it! Yay me! I also managed to nab a couple of gifts at a recent holiday bazaar that we went to, but that was totally happenstance.

As for that mental list, I had every intention of making those purchases well before, well, NOW, because I hate, hate, hate shopping at Christmas. People are so ugly and mean when they are Christmas shopping. And that makes me sad....and pissy. So, I've decided that I am going to make most of my purchases online. This wears me out because I am always determined to find the best of what I am looking for: best telescope, best video mp3 player, best (gift that I am getting for SugarDaddy). So, I go to several different sites to read reviews and then to compare prices. Then, inevitably, my short attention span gets the best of me & I forget where I found the best buy and have to start over. It's almost as exhausting as getting out and actually physically shopping. Only without the rude people.

THEN I found Shop.com. And this place rocks. I know that there are lots of comparison shopping sites. But those always end up frustrating me. Shop.com is designed for women. Don't ask me how, it just makes more sense to me. I like it. I can find what I want and, regardless of which store I am buying from, it all goes into one cart and gets paid for at once. No forgetting where I found the good buys!

Mom Central describes it thusly:

Shop.com is a comparison shopping site specifically designed for women that allows you to shop from over 2,000 merchants all in one place. Purchases can be conveniently made using one universal "shopping cart" to buy everything at one time or by clicking over to participating merchants' sites.

SHOP.COM gives busy moms an opportunity to ease the stress of holiday shopping with tools to help us figure out what to buy, find recommendations, and pinpoint which stores have the best price. With a combined total of over 20 million products, we can stop running from store to store to find the best deal or the perfect gift for the impossible-to-shop-for relative.

Additionally, SHOP.COM provides expert advice, shopping tips, and articles, while giving easy ways to save money via price comparison tools, coupons, and rebates.

See? Cool. And stress reducing. I am SO using this site this year. It'll save me a ton of money on Xanax alone!!


Happy Shopping!

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