November 24th, 2009 
Genesis As of tomorrow, Christmas is just one month away. I don’t know about you, but I’m starting to panic a little! As a work at home mom, I end up working even when I should be thinking about making gifts or doing some shopping and until recently, we didn’t have a car, which made shopping tough.
Fortunately, you don’t have to waste a lot of time heading out into the crowds and battling with other shoppers to get the best deals on toys. We have online shopping now and let me tell you, it is a lifesaver!! I KNOW you can take ten minutes each evening to sit down and scan the internet for gifts. There’s no need to leave the house, so it’s pretty cool.
Now, I know many of you have businesses that are perfect for those of us still hunting for gifts, so I’d like to invite you to leave your information and URL in the comments. We can use this as a sort of shopping catalog for wahms and we can all support each other.
Before we get started, I have a few other suggestions for you.
The RocketMoms group has put together a HUGE shopping lens on Squidoo for you. It’s constantly being updated, and all the products are chosen by moms, so you know they’re going to be good. If you’re still looking for ideas, I highly suggest checking out this fun shopping lens. I have a few lenses on there, as well. 
Also, Amazon is holding Black Friday sales all this week, so it’s the perfect time to start your Christmas shopping . . . without the hassles of getting up at 3 am (never understood that!) to get trampled by crazy people trying to grab the last few My Talking Whatevers. All the sales are limited and dirt cheap (think DVDs for $2, electronics up to 50% off, etc.) You can find great Amazon deals here: Black Friday Deals
Don’t forget to leave your link in the comments along with a description if you offer a great service or product that could be purchased as a Christmas gift!
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Why not buy during sales earlier in the year? You can always store things!
For those of us who shop at the last minute, unfortunately, online shopping is out of the question, unless we pay an arm and a leg for overnight shipping. It’s off to the malls for me.
Work at home Dads can benefit from this information, too. I did all of the shopping for our teenage son and my wife pretty much took care of the rest. She enjoys shopping for clothes and jewelry for the Moms, sisters and nieces, but I’d just assume order everything over the Internet myself. I got what I thought were great deals on things like video games and DVDs, etc., through shops on ebay. Especially when I was able to get some of the harder to find games. But I’ve learned a valuable lesson this year: This past weekend’s Sunday paper had many of the newer hard-to-find video games at prices even lower than what I ended up paying online. So, do I order early on the internet next year or take my chances with last minute sales?
there are still lots of deals as of this week since it’s just days before Christmas. Moms will love moccasin slippers, especially those from Minnetonka.
With today’s fast paced society, I think more and more people are turning to online shopping especially with UPS and FedEx making it so inexpensive and easy. Sometime I think you can spend less money on shipping than gas driving around to different stores. I will be interested to see what will become of the malls in the coming future.
I am a huge fan of the new rave of online shopping for two reasons. First, with my busy schedule, I don’t have time to spend the day at the mall. Second, it is how I make my living with my customers shopping online my website, http://www.Addicted2scents.com. I was fortunate enough to be at the ground level of this new, successful, fast growing company and I am building a customer base that realizes just how wonderful the product is in addition to the benefits of shopping online. I love it!!
Online shopping saves soo much time and gas money that can be spent on presents!!
OMG! I haven’t even started shopping yet! Thanks for all the tips!
The Black Friday deals have come and gone and many people still have many, many items to buy off their lists. Fortunately, on-line shopping does make crossing off those items easier than ever before in history. Technology is a God send!!
I personally refuse to stress out and drive to those over crowded malls and department stores in order to get those hard to find or last minute presents, that always linger on my list.
I enjoy being able to search, click and pay right from the comfort of my living room and know that the UPS or Fed Ex person will be dropping all those purchases right in front of my door steps!!
And to help out all those parents that want to experience the same plesure as my self and be able to buy one of this year’s HOT and hard to find Toy, the Zhu Zhu Pet Hamster, I have my own resource up http://getzhuzhupets.org, that will hopfully help others find this much wanted gift.
@Scott, that’s a very cool concept for simplifying shopping and finding hard to find items.
After seeing some of the threads here I just wanted to offer up a solution that I know works. A lot of times there are individuals that purchase as many of the “Hot” products that come out during the holidays. They then turn around and resell them on eBay and Amazon but at 30-40% above retail. I have a site that can monitor the Amazon stock levels in as close to real time as you can get (every 5 seconds) Amazon provides this information in an API which I won’t get into here but it allows us to get to the front of the line when the product becomes available in Amazon stock. NOTE: When it becomes available in Amazon stock not a 3rd party selling it on Amazon. So you may see a product in stock on Amazon but if you look carefully right under the pricing they tell you who is selling it. If it doesn’t say Amazon it’s a 3rd party, don’t buy it from them you will pay way too much. So if you are interested check out this site and it explains in great detail how to monitor products you want to purchase on Amazon and alert you “in real time” when it becomes available. Be prepared because your PC will make a sound that will get your attention so if you are not sitting at your PC you can run over and click the purchase button and get the item you are looking for, AT RETAIL! Check it out and let me know what you think..
http://www.squidoo.com/Hard-to-Find-Toys
I know I tend to get carried away buying stuff for my kids, too! You really have to put a limit on it or you end up spending a lot.
Thank goodness for online shopping! AND my hubby and I make a wish list on amazon because he is impossible to buy for! I’m trying to keep it a bit simple this year – but the toy shopping is kinda fun
I am a work at home mom myself and I can appreciate online shopping anything from toys to cloths.
I also have a Tot toys website for the moms looking to do a little christmas shopping for their tots.
Great site and thanks for allowing us to share.
looking forward to the bargains!
This is a great idea. Shopping online line is much easier and less stressful than participating in that after Thanksgiving mayhem!
A call to action for online marketers to pool their resources to help customers and each other!
Kudos….
I’ll let my friends know about your efforts.
One of my good friends is a great mother. She does more for her three kids than most people could conceive of. I would trust her with my own son, and that is saying something. But her husband works a lot of hours and after four years of being a stay-at-home mother, she was starting to get a little buggy, for lack of a better word. She was craving the interaction of adults in her life, far more than occasionally logging onto Facebook.
She decided that she wanted a job. But she did not want a job that required leaving a care giver to take care of her children. She would not compromise on that, yet she felt without the ability to spend time with adults, she was going to have problems. Her training after high school was beauty school. She was great at cutting hair, doing nails, using make-up, and things of that sort. In fact, two of her female friends had asked her be the person to apply their make-up when they married.
So her husband, being the good guy that he is, put his mind to it and came up with the answer for her. Because of his encouragement, she became an independent beauty consultant. This had several great benefits for her. Her training was in this field to start with, and it was something she was quite good at. Secondly, she got adult interaction with other women who had similar interests. Sometimes the women would come to her house, sometimes she would go to theirs. In many instances, she was able to even kill two birds with one stone. Many of the women also had children close to her childrens’ ages. So the business appointment also doubled as a play date for the children.
It was a very refreshing change of pace for her, and she truly began to thrive. She didn’t have to leave her children in someone else’s care, and yet she was earning more income for the family and doing something she absolutely loved. She also got to make her own hours. Most importantly, she was getting the adult interaction she needed for her own sanity.
She has now been an independent>independent beauty consultant for two years. She told me she lives in the best of all possible worlds, and I have rarely known someone so contented with their life. Its amazing how sometimes one simple little change can help a person go from some having fundamental dissatisfaction with their life, to thinking their life is one they would never trade.