need vs. want

today i bought the young boys two quilts at target.

i love quilts. i have loved the circo line of embroidered and embellished quilts forever. i have waited for them to go on clearance, every year, only to miss them because, NGL, i won't buy them even at half off. they must be 75% off!

well, i've been stalking our neighborhood target and even one a little further than our neighborhood ever since they got the new line.

turtles? LOVE THEM!

http://www.target.com/p/Circo-Backyard-Friends-Quilt-Set/-/A-13178913

when i noticed they were 30% off my visits increased. last week they were 50% off but i didn't really have $70 to drop on quilts. did i hold out until or cave? i held out and yesterday i stopped by. still 50% off and plenty of full and twin sized quilts (i needed one of each). this morning i was tempted to stop at target on my way to work but didn't. i did, however, stop by on my way home and they were 75% off, baby.

however, there were only full sized ones left and i didn't need two full sized ones. there was also one cars one left (also full-sized) so i got one of each, figuring a little "extra" quilt never hurt anyone and pea may not have a twin sized bed forever.

of course now i'm doubting my logic. my youngest boys are two and five. they always want what the other has. i can "force" the turtles on sprout but pea already had an opinion when i showed him the turtle quilt the other day. he'd much prefer the transportation one. which means sprout would, too.

http://www.target.com/p/Circo-Transportation-Quilt-Set-Twin/-/A-12307922

anyhow, i'm walking towards the registers with these two quilts in my arms. just last week i bought two beautiful wool carpet runners at target. also 75% off. they were normally $90 each and i walked out with both for less than $45 (target debit card + 5% savings = awesome!) it caused some drama with awesome papa because 1. he didn't know what a ridiculously good deal they were 2. it didn't matter, he doesn't think i should be spending money on stuff like that and 3. he wasn't sure we needed them even though i've been eyeing them for two years now.

awesome papa is a pretty lucky guy. i let him know when he's right and he was right about the runners. i'd liked them since we were in our old house where they wouldn't have fit anywhere. i thought they'd go very well in this home, especially since nearly half the square footage is tile. turns out, i didn't like them much and decided, even at $22 a piece, i didn't need them and therefore they weren't a good deal.

i've come a long way. just last week i walked away from a $120 radio flyer wagon marked down to $30. true story. (and yes. at yet another target). but still, i'm walking to the registers and feeling an overwhelming sense of first-world guilt. my kids don't need more blankets or bedding. they don't need anything. i've been battling my conflicting negative world-view and anti-consumerist beliefs with "shopping to fill an emotional void" syndrome for years and just when i feel like i have a healthy grasp on my spending habits i now have to balance and reconcile my desire for simpler living with the desire for my room-sharing children to have matching bedspreads.

i used to spend so much time and energy shopping mindlessly that now i fill that time and space with over-thinking each purchase, weighing and analyzing want vs. need. perhaps i waste less time thinking about stuff, these days. for instance, instead of walking around with something in my cart before deciding whether or not to buy it,  i can just look at it or hold it for a few seconds and know. i knew i wanted these quilts even if need was not a factor. i knew i wanted these quilts before i even had two little boys sharing a room. i knew i wanted them so much that i was stopping by target at least once a week for the last few months and more than once a week more recently, just to look at the pricetag on these quilts.

so why were these quilts causing so much grief? i really wrestled with the question of need. i almost put them back after all that time spent waiting for them to go on final markdown. i felt good that i could provide beautiful, detailed, and colorful 100% cotton quilts for my children but immediately struggled with the possibility that they were made by children in a labor-camp somewhere in indonesia. THESE ARE THE THINGS THAT GO THROUGH MY HEAD EVERY DARN TIME I'M IN A STORE.

and still. i bought them.

is this normal? is this what "aware" people do? i tell myself that if i was really aware i wouldn't have spent at least 60 minutes running into target over the last several weeks just to check on the boys' bedding aisle. i would have been procuring the confidence and fabric to make my boys their very own custom quilts.

but what do i know?