Shop and Save at the Children's Place

It's that time of year--legalized over-spending on "necessities" for the children...or should I say justified "Back to School" shopping sprees. My kids don't really need anything more to wear, color with, or write on...but we go through this ritual every year when they fill the classroom orders for new scissors, paper, crayons, markers, ya-da, ya-da, ya-da. After I dropped an easy $200 at the local Wal-Mart and Walgreens on "necessities"--I got annoyed when I hauled it home and took inventory of what they still had from last year. I think they should just pack up the stuff that's still in their backpacks and haul it right back to school. But NO...sending used supplies is not part of the ritual. It does kind of grate that used supplies don't look pristine and precisely packaged just so...but it's going to look abused after the first week of school anyways. But I did what every other mother out there did...and caved in and bought all brand-new stuff to go in their desks, although, somewhat reluctantly.

Where I'm not so reluctant is the clothes-department. There's just something about when your kid goes to school in a shirt without stains on it that screams "that Mom is doing her laundry correctly!!" Realistically, it should be screaming that the kid didn't slop around in it or if they did--Mom caught it with Spray-n-Wash before the dryer set it permanently in the Hall of Shame-wear. And again--the kids don't exactly need clothes, but I have some standards I've set in the parenting department for myself. Rule number 1: Don't send the kids to school in anything that has a rip, stain, food pattern, or self-inflicted graffiti (boogers, ketchup, syrup that missed the waffle) on it. I feel like it reflects more on the mother than it does on the child if the kid leaves the house showing everyone what you had for breakfast. So I have no problem refreshing the wardrobe because goodness knows, I have some children that hold degrees in Soiling-ology.

I came across a great coupon for the Children's Place for 20% off your entire purchase till the first week of September. That's pretty good. I'm thinking about the clearance racks and hair knick knacks, tights, those cool plaid skorts, etc., etc., etc. And in a couple more weeks, the new stuff they put out for the "Back to School" attention-grabbers will be marked down. There's always a deal to to had with entire purchase discounts! If you go to the website, there's also another deal for 25% off of a $50 purchase as well. It seems to add up if you can layer a coupon or code onto sales' items. http://www.childrensplace.com/www/b/TCP/emailj/DM-CPN-072810.html (the 20% coupon) and http://www.childrensplace.com/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/EmailJump?langId=-1&catalogId=10001&storeId=10001&jumpId=cpn-wk25-0821 (the 25% off coupon).