I had an epiphany tonight...in a Kohl's dressing room

of all the places huh?

So I needed some alone time and R was more than willing to oblige but for me to get alone time I need to leave the house.  R cannot just take the kids anywhere in winter here and he has to work tommorrow anyway.  So I tucked the kids into bed, gave R a kiss and left.  Where else would I go to get alone time but to Walmart?  Yeah, it's not like we have coffee shops or bookstores or even a mall with a food court that I could go and people watch, read a book and relax...not happening in this area, so Walmart it is.  I browsed the clearance 'cause that's just what I do and I found some cute flying Tinkerbell things that I just knew K would love.  I also found plastic Disney princess Jewelry boxes that were perfect gifts for my older neice, K and O.  Awesome!  I ended up getting that stuff, a Dale Earnhardt JR shirt for my MIL (on clearance as well) and a couple requests of R's...all in all I spent less than $20...not bad, but I forgot the reason I went (besides the requests for R)....a card for my parents' anniversary which is tommorrow...Happy 31 years of Marriage mom and dad!

I walked out feeling good that I spent less than $20...go me!  So I decided to stop by Kohls and walk around and see if they still had the picture frame my mom had really wanted.  I looked at kids' clothes first and saw so many cute things.  The clearance tags were almost screaming at me to buy buy buy....60%, 70%, 80% off!!  Holy Cow!  Great Deals...but I remembered that the kids have too many clothes already so I stopped looking...it's not a good deal if they won't get enough use out of it...and that's when the epiphany started.  I continued to browse around some more.  Found a super cute winnie the pooh plush with a musical christmas book..70% off...oh that would be so cute for my youngest neice next Christmas and I grabbed it.  I browsed a bit more and found the picture frame my mom wanted marked down to $3..so I grabbed that (anniversary gift!) and they had adorable angel picture frames that I just knew the sitter would love (also $3).  I next went over to the men's section and found clearance boxer shorts (the kind in the shaped tin, budweiser, Xbox, South Park, etc), and wallets...ooh Dad needs a new wallet badly...but I knew I could get him a wallet cheaper (planning on getting him one for his birthday anyway) and R hasn't even opened his new pack of boxer shorts yet...I passed on those as well. 

I figured out that once you walk around a department store long enough the deals start to look really good..even if they are not that good.  Oh those jeans are originally $40 and they are clearance for $15!  Wow!  A steal!  uh huh..right!  But that didn't stop my brain (which knows better!!) from thinking wow what a great deal.  I ended up grabbing a few pairs of pants to try on.  I headed to the dressing room and while I was in there suddenly everything became clearer.  It was very odd.  I stopped..put my jeans back on and sat down for a minute.  WTF am I doing?!?!  I have 6 pairs of really good jeans, I have 4 pairs of yoga pants, I have a couple pairs of dress pants, I have khakis, I have pj pants.  WTF am I doing?!?!  Because these pants are $7.20 I think I need them!?!?!?  I do NOT need them.  I have pants just like them at home!  Why do I need yet another pair of pants?!?!  Then I started to think about my purchases at Walmart.  Did I really need to buy those toys for the kids?  Another thing to add to the 4 toy boxes (yes 4!!! and big toys that don't fit in the toyboxes besides the ones stuffed into them already!) UGH!  WTF is wrong with me?!?  We have so much stuff and yet it always seems like there is something else we need that we don't actually need.  Then I realized I was still in the dressing room, I grabbed up the picture frames, left behind the Winnie the Pooh and hightailed it to the registers and got the heck out of there.  WTF?!?  I spent so much time and energy in the 20 days since Christmas buying stuff for next Christmas and Birthdays in this coming year that I already feel like I am behind on shopping for a holiday that is over 11 Mother F'in Months away!  WTF?!?  Sure I am glad that I am ahead of the game and won't have to be out searching for deals when it gets closer to the birthday of the recipient but why?!?  So my neice can have another toy that she probably won't play with for more than a day or two?  So my kids can have another toy that I step on, complain about, the dog eats or I end up donating to the thrift store because they are bored with it after a couple months?!?  All the way home I thought about this and how shopping and buying gifts is so ingrained in us as consumers...I literally feel sick over the whole thing...mainly the money and time I spent doing this.  UGH!  I don't know how to fix it...how to make it better...how to stop!!  Of course I am still going to buy gifts for my loved ones and things we actually do need but I need to stop the one woman shopping spree and figure out a way to better channel my energy. 

my only consellation in all of this is that I have not spent a lot of money for what I have bought and have not onced used my credit card to pay for any of it.  I have gotten some pretty amazing deals and it is all on stuff that I know the recepient will love but then again...it's stuff.  I am so sick of stuff!

Of course I will still buy gifts and look for deals but how do I change this?  When is enough, enough?!?  Is there ever a point when I can just say ok I am done?  I know I can and I have before but I really need to just stop for a bit and reprioritze and take a break....I think that is the meaning of my thoughts.

~rant over~