It was like Christmas...for ourselves!

Two weeks ago we headed off to Buffalo for a little cross-border shopping. We felt like we couldn’t lose by taking our day at the mall two hours from home.

And we were right. Well, except for the amount of money we 'lost' in the spending spree.

We made the trip a two-day event, with the first day spent at the outlet mall in Niagara Falls, NY and the second day spent at Target and the Walden Galleria in Buffalo. We left our house right after rush hour, dropped Austin off at my parents’ house for a sleepover and headed south to shop.

It’s such a simple concept – but since our dollar hasn’t been stronger than the American dollar for 30 years (which is longer than I can remember); the idea that the price you see is the price you pay is almost a difficult concept to wrap your head around. I’ve been to the U.S. many, many times over the years and I’ve always had to do the quick math in my head when deciding whether something was worth the price on the ticket.

Now suddenly, we were at an outlet mall, where not only the prices were good to begin with, the fall sales were on.

Needless to say, we made off like bandits.

I managed to snag a pair of Gap maternity jeans for $30 and a really nice sweater, and Ryan bought three or four pair of pants that Eddie Bower was practically giving away. And shoes! We went to this Sketchers store, where we got three pairs of shoes – one being a pair of boots – for $100. Even Austin made off with four pairs of Baby Gap pyjamas that retail for $25 each. We paid the whopping price of $9 a pair.

The next morning (after a nice evening of a dinner for two and a movie – things we never get to do anymore) we decided to hit Target where we found the biggest deal of the day in the baby aisle – a Bumbo baby chair (because the one we had when Austin was a baby was a loaner) for $40. In Canada, that same chair is still priced $60.

By the time we hit the Walden Galleria, we were almost shopped out. But I really wanted to visit a few stores that weren’t at the outlet mall – mainly Victoria’s Secret. Without sales and outlet prices, the mall wasn’t such a steal, but it was nice buying a $45 bra that was actually $45 and not $60 or more in Canadian dollars.

Finally, at the Clinique counter at Macy’s. I wanted to check out the price of foundation – which I pay $24.50 a bottle for at The Bay.

I asked the very friendly woman, who responded $19.50. I responded, “I’ll take two.” As she was ringing up my purchase, she smiled and said “you must be from Canada because all the Canadians are asking the price and then buying two!”