The Dollar Store

My kids have a love/hate relationship with The Dollar Store. To be more precise… they love to go to The Dollar Store, and they hate when we drive by The Dollar Store without stopping. *sob! (The Dollar Store is of such importance in our household, that you will notice we always bold-type The Dollar Store, both in print, and if possible, in speech ;)

I admit that I have fostered this love of all things cheap and trinkety in my children. I make frequent trips to The Dollar Store to stock up on gift wrap, gift bags, and tissue paper (we go to a lot of birthday parties). It’s also a great place to buy hair elastics, stocking and Easter basket ‘stuffers’, and plastic containers for the playroom. True to its sign… EVERYTHING is a dollar!

(Sidenote: you DO have to double check what you buy… I once bought a slew of gift bags for the book fair at preschool. When parents would buy books for their child’s teacher, the books would go into the teacher’s individual gift bags, and at the end of the week, we presented each teacher with their bag of books. The bags were actually quite pretty. They looked like a watercolor print done over some old text. However, if you looked too closely at the text, it was all about Freud and sexual frustration. OOPSIE! )

Soooo, in addition to being a ‘go-to’ source for inappropriately worded gift bags, I have also discovered that The Dollar Store is a great incentive for all three of my kids.

Imagine that you have spent your whole life going with your mom to Target or Walmart, only to hear the following on EVERY single trip to the store: “No, you can’t have that. No, we’re not buying a toy today. Seriously, put that back. We’re not buying it. Just because you licked it does NOT make it yours.”

Then… imagine cruising into The Dollar Store, and having your mom say, “If you behave while we’re in here, you can pick out anything you want!” (albeit just one thing… I mean, let’s not go crazy here;) And then the race is on, as my kids go from one aisle to the next, trying to figure out exactly what they want to take home in their hot little hands… “Um, no thank you, I actually don’t need a bag. I plan to rip into the packaging as soon as I get into the van, and leave behind little bits of cardboard for my mom to vacuum up for the next six months.”

The Dollar Store has become our drug of choice… our ‘reward’ for a completed chore chart, an incentive to keep the toothpaste tubes clean (don’t tell me you’ve forgotten that blog already?!), and in general, an inexpensive way for my kids to get their fill of completely useless junk.

My mom still laughs about the day we took the kids to The Dollar Store, and Davis was so excited to go down the ‘gun aisle’. Oh, but didn’t you know there is a gun aisle in The Dollar Store? Water guns, pirate pistols, police revolvers… a virtual mother lode of toy weaponry.

Basically, if it’s plastic, made in China, breaks within the first hour of play, and sends my kids over the moon with excitement, it’s at The Dollar Store.

Oh, and if you get a birthday gift from me that’s housed in a bag that just HAPPENS to be covered in Psych 101 jargon, what can I say? I like to stock up. ;)