Our recent trip to the US for my mom's memorial wasn't all bad. We did have some laughs and I did get to do a very tiny bit of shopping. We got to eat crab! Plus my DH packed our suitcases so well, I didn't have to leave much stuff behind (for a future trip).
The bit of shopping I did was for folic acid (much cheaper), an almost 3lb mix bag of Reese's pieces, cups, sticks & fast breaks, Tom's of Maine Wintermint toothpaste, some chapstick (Vanilla Lip Smacker) and Smarties (US kind, not Canadian kind). As I said, I only did an itty bit of shopping, but it was enough. DH did buy himself some books to bring back.
Another important part of visiting my family is food. Almost every (every?) trip we go out in the bay or ocean with my dad to get clams, crab and/or fish. This time there was only crab and muscle (clams) runs. My dad took people out two times for crab while we were there! (I'm sort of kicking myself at the moment, because I probably should have gone with him at least one of the times. Such is life.) In addition, I have to eat at Taco Bell at least once when I'm in the US. Bean burritos just bring back great memories and I really do love them. But what I love even more is the Taco Bell sauce packets (mild is my favorite). I'm very lucky that my family is so supportive of my Taco Bell Sauce addiction. Whenever they go to TB, they take extra packets and save them for me. We were able to bring back another TB bag full of them with us!
In addition to those few things I bought, I wanted to bring back many of my mom's knitted items (hats, scarves, socks, bags, baby booties, etc), yarn, some of her knitting books (14 in total) and just books (about the same amount) in general along with some other miscellaneous stuffs. And because my DH loves me so much, we went and bought one more (used) suitcase to carry more stuff back with us. We came back home with 3 suitcases jam packed with stuff. Our total weight was almost 150 pounds of stuff! I know how much my DH hates packing our suitcases at the end of a stay, only because I find so much stuff to drag home with us. But I love him dearly for it each and every time. Although, I do like to think I've gotten a bit better about it over the years.
So while our trip was a difficult one, it wasn't all bad. I was able to stock up on some of my dear US products. *big grin* I also got to spend time with family.
