Done Shopping!

I got so much Christmas shopping done on Thursday that I was aching to finish up today. I had to get gifts for my niece E since her mother had not given me her list yet. ;) I also had to get another gift for my niece A and nephew N and Santa and stocking stuffer gifts for DS#1 and DS#2. I was originally going to go to Target to get gifts but I decided to go to a nearby locally owned toy store first. I love going there because they have toys that the major chains don't have plus they wrap the presents for you. I managed to finish out my list on my first stop. Woohoo! I have to admit that I purposely tried to find things there just so I wouldn't have to keep looking.

As I previously stated, my original intent had been to go to Target to get gifts. When I had announced at home earlier that I was going to be going to Target this morning, the younger three kids immediately volunteered to go with me because they just LOVE to go to Target. With my necessary shopping done, I just let the kids play. DS#3 immediately went to the Thomas the Tank Engine aisle. He found this "interactive" Thomas and spent the entire time pushing the button to make it sing and talk.

Even with it being so close to Christmas, DS#2 begged to buy a remote control car set (with two cars) at Target with his own money. Money just burns a hole in that boy's pocket, but I let him buy it, knowing that the toy would be well loved. He apparently played with it all afternoon (while I was napping with DS#3) so I'm glad that he's gotten a lot of use from it.

After Target we headed to the nearby mall so we could eat lunch. I was just at the mall yesterday, but there's a Chick-Fil-A there and that's where the kids wanted to eat. After lunch and a stop at the Haagen-Dazs ice cream shop in the mall, we headed to the Lakeshore Learning Store for their weekly free crafts for kids. We haven't been able to go in a long time because of soccer. While DD and DS#2 were crafting, DS#3 kept busy playing with some of their toys.

He just loved their magnetic fishing set, although you can see that he doesn't exactly fish in the conventional way. :) He spent quite a bit of time there before playing in their kitchen area. I thought it was interesting that only girls were there but my rough and tumble DS#3 also seemed to love playing in the kitchen. After trying to bite their play food (bread) I managed to distract him into playing with this other play food that you can "slice" instead. Luckily, this is one toy that we already have at home, because he didn't want to leave after playing with it.

At this point, DS#2 and DD showed up with their turkey creations. At first DS#2 had been reluctant to do the craft, but the lady told him he could add extra eyes and make it an "alien" turkey and he was all over that idea! I had to laugh when she said that boys his age were into that sort of stuff and she is SO right! He used extra "hands" to decorate the back of his turkey (along with the extra eyes) and DD used lots of extra feathers. She even called her turkey an "alien" so once again she shows that she is an only girl amongst brothers.

By the time we got home it was already after 2PM. DS#3 and I took our naps then we went to church and then out to dinner at Chili's. DD likes to make this face where she smiles as wide as she can while opening her eyes as much as she can. I call it her "extreme" smile but I think she might call it her "scary" face. I have to admit that she does look a little scary and here she is showing her Papa how scary she can be. Of course she can't make this face without giggling.

We were supposed to be busy today with five soccer games. I guess we kept busy without soccer!