A few years ago I ordered some adorable return address labels customized for my family, with caricatures of our family for the holidays. They were kind of pricey (25.00 for about 70 labels). Well, it turns out Vistaprint.com has them FREE right now! Its online office supply/ stationery retailer that is always offering promotions for one thing or another in hopes of getting us to buy more of their products.
I've also gotten Christmas cards from Vistaprint in the past. Starting December 3rd, go to www.vistaprint.com/11alive to get a special discount for 11Alive Values Blog Readers!
And by the way, if this offer later expires, remember to go to www.retailmenot.com for all the latest coupon codes!
Ok, I just saved you lots of money to spend on your loved ones, save in the bank or give to charity.. Happy Holidays!!!
If you're doing a little Cyber Monday shopping, you can get some great shopping tips and help from a couple of small business people right here in Georgia.
I like http://wantnot.net/ and http://www.couponsdrawer.com for a couple of different reasons: I interviewed Mir Kamin of http://wantnot.net/ awhile back and she is a great writer on lots of different blogs, her site can be very useful but its also pretty funny at times.. so take a look. Mir lives in Athens, GA!
Sometime in the future we hope to interview the creators of couponsdrawer.com It's another website full of online shopping deals and codes. The creator of this website is a quadraplegic living in Toccoa, GA who was injured in a diving accident many years ago.
Oftentimes when you use the coupon codes provided by a certain website, that owner of that website ( a sometimes VERY a small business owner) gets a very small commission. So while the biggees out there have their place, why not click on a neighbor?
I can't count the number of times I've headed to Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport to report on long lines at the main security checkpoint.
You've all seen video of lines extending into the airport's atrium. You've heard the interviews with frustrated passengers worried they'll miss their flights.
But I was in for a surprise this Thanksgiving.
No long lines. And the wait times never topped 20 minutes (so far, at least).
I consider myself a fairly frequent flier, but I didn't realize how much security has changed at Hartsfield-Jackson until I went there for a story last week.
The main checkpoint looks the same, minus the long lines. But like me, you might do a double-take when you see the two new security checkpoints. The South one on the Delta side has four lanes. On the North side, you'll see six new lanes.
With 10 new lanes for a total of 32, airport officials they haven't seen a wait time of longer than 16 minutes since the lanes opened in October. Wow.
There are new rules, too, that will make a lot of sense if you've ever been snow-skiing.
Security lanes are now described as "self-select" lanes. That means passengers pick a lane based on their level of expertise. The fastest lanes for frequent fliers and business travelers are marked with black diamonds. Casual travelers are supposed to use lanes with blue squares. Lanes with green circles are the ones set aside for passengers with children and those with special needs.
It's tradition time. For the first ten months of the year, we hustle through our lives, rarely stopping to think about observing or creating family traditions. Then November hits and we're transported back in time.
I remember standing in my Grandmother's kitchen just outside of Detroit, Michigan. My mom's seven brothers and sisters, their spouses, and their kids gathered in a huge circle to say grace. My grandma decided to start a new tradition: everyone around the circle needed to name something for which they were thankful. She started with a long and emotional list of all the things she's made it through that year and how happy she was were were all together... then onto the next relative.... and the next. The food grew colder and the answers grew shorter as we made our way through our massive family. Finally, the last in line, an uncle, declared: "I'm thankful this is over!"
Because members of our family moved to different parts of the United States: California, Florida, Washington, and Georgia... we dodn't have those huge Thanksgivings anymore. My mom still likes to go around the table to have everyone list their thanks. One big difference: my family doesn't celebrate Thanksgiving on Thanksgiving... for that matter, we don't celebrate Christmas on Christmas.
The reason is simple: I'm here at WXIA. Since I started working in TV, I've worked every Thanksgiving and every Christmas. It's just part of the job. As I look around the newsroom, I see many of the same people I saw last year... and the year before. Paul Crawley working on a Thanksgiving shopping story; Donna and Kathy assigned to Hossea Feed the Hungry; Jay and Kenny spent the day at the USO. Upstairs, the breakroom is full of all the fixings; a guilt offering from our bosses for working this holiday. (It's not mom's... but it's not bad.)
As I look around me, I realize this is my Thanksgiving Tradition. Let's be honest here: all of us working today would rather be with our families. If you ask the firefighters, nurses, police officers, retail cashiers, 911 operators, pilots, toll workers... I bet they'd all say the same thing: working today means missing out on observing family traditions.
For me, it also means making some new ones. It means eating mom's Thanksgiving dinner on some other night. And spending the real Thanksgiving with this group of misfits I call my 11 Alive family.
Jessica Dauler calls Black Friday her favorite shopping day of the year.
Dauler created the website, Jessicashops.com ,which compiles a weekly list of deals, sales, store closing and money saving tips each week.
She told me she doesn't plan to hit the mainstream malls this Friday. Instead, she plans to start at Discover Mills, where Sak's 5th Avenue's Off Fifth store and Last Call at Nieman Marcus open at midnight. Next, she plans to go to the Tanger Outlet Mall, and if she has time, the North Georgia Premium Outlets in Dawsonville. Dauler said she anticipates great deals at Filene's Basement, Leomann's, TJ Maxx and Marshall's as well.
Sounds like a plan to me!! To learn more shopping tips from Jessica Dauler, go to jessicashops.com
