And now... holiday shopping.

Today was largely spent on-line, doing my holiday shopping. Honestly, even with having several items already bookmarked and a really good idea of what I wanted to get and where I wanted to get it, it took me hours to get everything ordered. Not only that, but I spent a good $25+ on shipping alone, and that was with getting free shipping on two of my orders.

And you know what? It was still better than going to the mall. I dislike the mall under the best of circumstances (honestly, these days it's just 50 stores selling variations on the same clothing, which I could just wait and get at the thrift store next year for $5/piece), but during the holidays? Forget it!

On-line shopping is not without its problems. If I go to a store, I just give them my credit card, sign the slip, and it's done. On the internet, I have to fill in my contact information and payment info, and some sites want you to even sign up for an account before you can so much as get a shipping quote and decide if you want to order after all. I signed up on one site, got ready to check out, and only as I was poised to type in my credit card info did I see that they wanted to charge me $20 to ship $35 worth of stuff. It's not like I was ordering bricks, either. Luckily a friend was able to hook me up with another source, with better prices, selection, and reasonable shipping. Hurrah!

The good news is that my holiday shopping is mostly done. I even purchased a few gifts for my in-laws, though the brunt of that will still fall to my husband. Now I just have to do my holiday crafting! I'll start tomorrow by making a present for the Secret Santa swap I'm taking part in. After that, it will be time to clay it up. Unfortunately, I won't be able to post this stuff until after the holidays, as some of the gift recipients have been known to peek at my blog.

In other news, the new website is not done yet. Hopefully tomorrow. I am assured that it will be cool.

Speaking of cool, today's Cool Thing is Legends by Valkyrie. I admit it, I played with Barbies when I was a girl, but these are way beyond that. Very cool custom dolls with clothes, weapons, and sometimes even beaded jewelry. I especially like her faeries and goddesses!