Garden Ridge Opened/There Goes My Budget

At some point last year, I sent up a little prayer asking God to help me be a better steward of my money. He listened, and shorty thereafter Garden Ridge went up in flames.

Temple of holiday decor, flameless candles, glass jars, cheap art, fake plants, pottery, an entire "Seen on TV!" section, obscure and random packaged foods from abroad, tiny little chotchkies. POOF! Up in smoke.

Apparently it was arson, but I'm not claiming any part of that. It happened while I was at Chuy's eating delicious enchiladas with that addictive tomatillo sauce. I saw the smoke, and hoped that it was nearby WalMart on fire and not Garden Ridge, because let's face it, this is Texas and there's a WalMart at every highway exit. But the nearest Garden Ridge is not near enough for me to even know where it is.

But hold on friends (insert trumpet fanfare here). Garden Ridge has re-opened! Wooooo!

I went the other night to check it out, and other than their decision to skip fall decor and go straight to Christmas, I was not disappointed.

Hello, nineteen aisles of cheap plastic Christmas bulbs! Good to see you, entire wall of doormats! I nodded to the eight rows of lamps and shades as I walked down to the reproduction vintage furniture quadrant. Greetings, fake factory cart coffee table! It was great. They even had a whole section of hospital scrubs, which has never made sense to me. But they were there, animal print and all!

And just before I left empty handed, (this was reconnaissance only) I spotted the one item that really epitomizes (1) Garden Ridge, and (2) Texas, the ten foot tall inflatable patriotic Marine Santa.

Welcome back Santa, and Semper Fi.