A Family Tradition

A Martin family tradition has always been to go out the day after Thanksgiving and shop for some bargains. Here is how it goes: My dad gets a newspaper for each family that has Thanksgiving with us. We each go through our papers, cutting coupons and writing down the places we want to go and the times they open/are having their sales, and the particular item we are hoping to purchase at that store. In years past, we've had bigger items on the list: those that necessitate getting up insanely early in order to get one before everyone else. (My brother-in-law actually stayed up all night waiting in line for a laptop a few years ago.) This year, Dougle and I had no particular 'big' item we wanted to purchase. This means: no super early mornings. We still woke up at 7am, but didn't arrive at the stores until closer to 8:00am (it takes so much longer getting ready with a child)! We hit several sales before they ended, got several good deals, and went home exhausted and happy. To me, this is so much fun! There is so many good memories that are brought up when we participate in this holiday tradition: we've waited in lines trying to be one of the first hundred who enter and get a prise or gift card, we've frozen our little noses getting out earlier than we ever have so far that winter, and we've made memories splitting up with different parents and shopping for the other parent/sibling (we always bought TONS more stuff when we went with mom than when we went out with dad....ummm)! It is wonderful. I doubt they have "Day After Thanksgiving" sales in Russia (no Thanksgiving in November there), but maybe, just for tradition's sake, we'll hit a few stores early in the morning and conjure up all those happy thoughts and memories!