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Toys & More ~ My Recent Operation Christmas Child Shoebox Stockpile Additions

A few months ago I won a Toys R Us gift card for my Operation Christmas Child shoebox packing on a blog giveaway.  We do not have a Toys R Us store near us so we had to order online.  The $125 didn't go real far, but we tried to get things on sale and clearance and by ordering $50 or more both times we received free shipping.

Toys R Us blog giveaway win shopping spree for Operation Christmas Child shoeboxes.
Sarah chose some items with multiples that can be split between boxes.





Three times we received the wrong item and they couldn't send us a replacement as it was out of stock, so they gave us the credit back and said to keep the item.  One item we cannot use in shoeboxes, but the other two we can.  Three items
we ordered in the last order were out of stock, so they credited the gift card and we still have $11.  I think we will be sending it to my friend to shop for us at her store so we don't have to pay shipping.

If you remember my Kohl's Gift Card Win Shopping Trip I bought a pair of flamingo flip flops for a 2 to 4 year old girl.  I was so excited when this order came and one of the puzzles is a flamingo!  Sarah didn't bother to tell me ahead of time.  She knows I love surprises!  I can only imagine the bright pink, flamingo themed box in my future. Fun!!


This is one of the items we received by mistake that we were able to keep.  It includes 10 board books.  I have added board books to my 2 to 4 year old girl box packing list so I was thrilled!


This is the item we ordered that was out of stock and they sent the board books we called and told them they tried to send it again and they sent a Spirograph set.  We called again and they said it was out of stock and gave us credit.  Then when Sarah ordered the second time, a few weeks later, it was back in stock -- no longer on sale, but she really liked it.  One side is traditional dominoes and the other side is animals. She is filling 10 to 14 year old girl shoeboxes and thought it would be good as they could play it like regular or they can play with younger siblings with the animal side.


If you'd like to learn about entering blog giveaways you can see how I have done it in this post:  How to Find and Enter Blog Giveaways.

Sarah had read that Dollar General was having 50% off their clearance items a few weeks back so she made a quick trip to see what she might find.  She wasn't able to get cartloads like some shoppers we have seen, but she did find some fun things.  These came to just under $6.00 and she used a gift card I had won on a giveaway.  The next day we checked three more Dollar Generals and they had nothing.  Clearance in our town is almost non-existent--even when it was 50% off our DG's had nearly nothing, so we were thrilled with this bagful of items she was able to get.

Dollar General clearance shopping.

I love these coloring books that include stickers -- two gifts in one.  I'll use the poker chips for making games, like the Travel Tic Tac Toe or Checkers Game.  She said the toothbrushes were 67¢ each, a little more than she likes to spend, but they have dinosaurs on them so she splurged because of other dinosaur items she has for making themed boxes.

Sarah also picked up some items at CVS for me this week.  These toothbrushes were free after extra bucks (she used $5 and got $4 back).  You can find all the latest CVS deals if you are interested on her blog: Simply CVS.

Clifford toothbrushes.

She also had her eyes on these and was waiting for after Valentine's clearance to pick them up for me.  She didn't let me know she had seen Hello Kitty pencils/valentine's there, but she was determined to go first thing Monday morning to see if there were any left.  If she waited for them to go lower than 50% off they would most likely be all gone -- our stores empty clearance super quickly.  She used a $5.00 gift card I had earned on Swagbucks and only paid 5 cents.

Hello Kitty pencils.
The hearts are mini maze puzzles.
Did you find some great items for your shoe boxes this week?

I made a fun Hello Kitty Themed Operation Christmas Child Shoebox.  You can also check out all of our shoebox additions here:  Shoebox Stockpile Saturday ~ Adding to Our Operation Christmas Child Shoebox Stockpile.

5 comments:

Denise Marie said...

Awesome deals! I think the Lord wanted you to get those board books!! Sarah is a savvy shopper! Fun, fun, fun.

Sheila said...

Just a question about the multipack toothbrushes, do you open the package and use the individual toothbrushes? Do you put them in a ziplock bag in the shoebox?
I have seen multipacks before but I usually buy individually packaged toothbrushes for "cleanliness".
I was wondering if it was ok to open the packages!?

Cheryl @ Simply Shoeboxes said...

Great question, Sheila. I have seen others just toss the toothbrushes in out of packages. We have never done that. If we buy multi packs and they can easily cut apart and still protect the toothbrush we do--sometimes it takes just a little piece of tape to keep it intact. We have not decided what we will do with these ones -- they do not look like they can separated too easily. We have discussed maybe just cutting them the best we can and then tuck them in a ziploc bag. We also have several toothbrushes that came with travel cases--we wondered about using those on these to separate them. We may just toss the whole package in as it is -- we read once where a child was sharing a toothbrush with 6 siblings, maybe they could share them. Since the cost was the same as a single toothbrush time we decided to go with these children's multi-pack. Sorry I couldn't be more help.

J Rodney said...

You really do have so many great things Cheryl, and I love the out of pocket cost. I've never shopped at Toys R Us online, but it sounds like they are just as awful as the actual stores. I'm actually surprised that the stores are still alive, because the prices are ridiculous and their clearance is just as bad. With Target and Walmart around, it is hard to see how they can survive. I'm glad to see you got a lot of things for your money though, and the little board books that was a wrong item are too cute.

Cheryl @ Simply Shoeboxes said...

We had so many problems with our orders and to get the credits for the wrong items. I would not choose this store to shop at regularly after this experience. I'm fond of the books, too, :-) .


             
Disclosure: Links on Simply Shoeboxes may be affiliate partners or referrals.
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