Tag: Mall shopping

This post was from a year ago. I came across it today and it brought back fond memories of shopping with our two oldest daughters. By the time our son came along, I guess taking three small children to the mall wasn’t such fun anymore. I don’t recall going to the mall very much with three children, and certainly not at Christmas time! But I do remember the lights and decorations, and of course the crowds!

When I was younger…much younger, I used to live at the mall. Well, not really. I absolutely loved the mall and spent many a Saturday there. Once I had children, they had the ‘joy’ of going with me. After all, pushing a stroller and dragging a toddler is a pretty good workout!

I look back at that time period and wonder what that was all about. I didn’t really spend that much money there, especially after the children came along. So it must have been the ambiance. As you know, the atmosphere is really great at a mall!

Christmas shopping was especially wonderful and exciting. The hour you cruised the parking lot, trying to find a parking spot in walking distance of that cement building rising from the pavement. Lugging out the stroller, diaper bag, and of course the coats. It would be freezing for that ‘walk’ to the mall and then you would have to find a place to ‘stuff’ them when you went back to normal clothing inside. I think our stroller had a weight limit of about 500 pounds, fully loaded! Then you would spend several hours, if not most of the day walking aimlessly along, trying to find a path through the masses of people doing the same.

Again, was this actually enjoyable? For some reason, I used to think so.

I think for me, it was the pull of the people. I have always LOVED to people watch. When I was a child, I could sit in an airport for hours, and sometimes it was about that long waiting for an overdue plane. I would imagine where they were going, if they were traveling alone, etc. People Christmas shopping hold the same allure. I would much rather sit and watch people shop these days, than actually shop. (You save a lot of money that way as well!)

The mall at Christmas time is beautiful. The decorations are always fun to look at, and the music puts you in that holiday frame of mind. But these days, my laptop is my BFF when it comes to shopping at any time of the year. Sounds pretty boring…huh?

I find as I get older, my thoughts are changing, the things I enjoy doing are not the same as they were even a few years ago. And I think that’s good and just fine. Many of us could not maintain the pace of our younger years. No, I still don’t want to become a couch potato and never go out, but I don’t enjoy being part of the crowd as much as I used to.

So, I reflect this morning over my young adulthood of shopping. I didn’t go to the mall this year, even though my husband tried to get me there this past Saturday. A couple of stores was about all I could handle. Most of my shopping was done from the comfort of my office at home. I could pull up sales and items from anywhere. They came right on time to my back door. I wrapped them in the comfort of my home, listening to Christmas music on Pandora. And I’m done…well in time for Christmas Day. Now that’s MY kind of shopping!