Been loading the van with a load of "to get rid of" stuff. Cleaned the kitchen and the floors, now settling down to do some painting.... I found a petrified McDonald's Hamburger in Keegan's toybox.... still in the kid meal bag. It was sorta scary how good it looked, it had to have been in there for awhile. I may need to rethink ever eating there again, but I do LOVE their Angus Mushroom Swiss burger!

I have made a decision about Christmas this year.... lots of hand made stuff, (I've been working on gifts since Sept) and I am only buying 5 gifts and 3 gift cards beyond what I can make. I am cheating on the buying. Thanks to Sears and Kmart, I am doing online lay-aways for the 5 gifts I want to buy, that's as far as my budget goes this year. I am hoping this means I do not have to step foot inside a store except to do my pickup. If you want to cheat too and have a store near you to pick up from, here are the links to their online layaway pages, all I have to say is they had better not screw this up! If I have to go shopping at the last minute because of a error on their part, heads will roll.

http://www.sears.com/shc/s/dap_10153_12605_DAP_Sears+Layaway
http://www.kmart.com/shc/s/dap_10151_10101_DAP_Kmart+Layaway

This is actually quite clever of Sears/Kmart... let customers buy online, pickup local, make payments online... makes for easy-peasy shopping, and should help make their store customer service easier to deliver. Unless Black Friday turns out some jaw breaking deals I am staying home from that this year due to budget cuts....except for the Crafter's Warehouse sale...I have to go to that one if they have anything worthwhile at all, it was a lot of fun last year even with the bone chilling hour wait to get into the store. JoAnn's Black Friday sale will be attended on account of necessity only if I need something to either finish or make a gift.

What is everyone else doing about gifts this year? I know Obama says we are recovering, but I do not feel recovered at all.