Do You Have a Shopping Vice?

Did you ever have one of those moments where you look down in your shopping bag and wonder what on earth you just bought? Maybe you don’t regret the purchase right away, maybe it creeps up on you months later when you look at that awful orange dress hanging in the closet or the ridiculously expensive purse hanging on a hook that you’ve never found an occasion to wear.

My downfall has always been holiday decorations. I suppose it’s the wanna-be Martha Stewart in me. Whenever Christmas rolls around the sparkle of Santa and reindeer always catches my eye. Of course, every time I get home and plop new holiday knickknacks and doodads onto the dining room table I instantly regret my purchases. Two or three days later I trot off to the store, wait in a long line and hand over whatever it was that I really didn’t need in the first place.

I don’t have the space to store all of these items. In the past I shoved them into crawl spaces in our house, but typically forgot to retrieve them when the holiday finally rolled around.

I used to return a lot of the things I bought. Probably somewhere in the neighborhood of 40 to 50%. Sometimes I didn’t have enough time to try something on before leaving the store, other times I tried the item on in the store but couldn’t decide if I really looked good in it. Still other times I just couldn’t ignore the lure of something bright and sparkly. Wouldn’t that Santa look so cute on my dining room table? Couldn’t I fill that bright red bowl with beautiful Christmas decorations?

I always kept the tags attached and the receipts filed in my handy-dandy, ever so organized plastic binder, but wouldn’t life but so much easier if I stopped buying stuff that would eventually be returned? If I stopped wasting money on stuff I never really needed in the first place. Yes, of course it would.

So this year I am making a vow to avoid the lure of ridiculously overpriced decorations that are used for such a short time each year. No more glittery orange pumpkins or Santa Claus figurines. Doesn’t everyone need a turkey on their mantle or a large ‘Happy Thanksgiving’ wreath of leaves on their front door? No. It turns out I don’t need them either.

It’s tough to ignore the decorations popping up in every store’s entryway, but this year I’m bound and determined not to buy anything I don’t need. For the time being I’m able to pass by the table wrapped in shiny silver and red without batting an eye.

I remind myself that I don’t like to dust, don’t want to find a place to store new knickknacks and above all else I don’t want to find myself back in line returning something I don’t need.

I suppose I should count my blessings. As far as shopping vices go I suppose the lure of holiday decorations is pretty benign. Do you have a shopping vice? Something that you find yourself buying even when you know you shouldn’t?