The kindergarten crazies, continued: shopping

Our tasks for the week are not big ones. I need to take in the waists of Baby Blue's leggings. I need to write thank-you notes from LG's birthday party a month ago. (Yeah, I know.) I need to write a letter to a friend with whom I've inexcusably fallen out of touch. (Because she doesn't have home access to teh internets, I tell you!) And we need to go shopping.

I hate shopping. I never do it unless it is absolutely unavoidable. My hatred of shopping has consequences. I wear stained, unfashionable clothes until they are ready for the rag bag. I never redecorate even the ugliest corners of the house. I buy groceries in enormous quantities simply to reduce the frequency with which I have to go to the grocery store. I send Mr. Blue -- who's quite fond of shopping, really, though there are very few things in life that he has any desire to acquire -- on any errands that can't be procrastinated into the distant future.

But every once in awhile there is a moment in which I am suddenly overcome by the desire to unzip my wallet and buy, baby, buy. And this impending kindergarten moment is one of them.

So even though the only things we really, really need to buy are more shirts and pants to replace the 3T sizes out of which LG has finally grown, we have big shopping plans. Big shopping plans. We are going kindergarten shopping. What does the well-supplied kindergartener need? I have no idea. I mean, they already have pencils and crayons in the classroom, right? And it's not like he needs to take notes in class, or a combination lock for his locker. In fact, I suspect that the well-supplied kindergartener needs a lunch box and a backpack (both of which we already have), and very little else. But LG wants a pencil box, like Moffat and Morgan bought in one of his going-to-kindergarten books. He wants to go kindergarten shopping like Moffat and Morgan and a certain kindergarten blogger that he follows closely. So we're going to go to Target. For pencil boxes. And adjustable-waist pants. And a new supply of plastic tchotchkes. Then maybe we'll go to Old Navy for new kindergarten shirts. Maybe even Mama will get a new shirt or two, because, despite Baby Blue's unwavering attachment to teh MILK, I seem to have finally graduated out of the extra-large t-shirt stage of nursing. I'm not a triple-Q cup anymore. Whoo-hoo!

Now here's my important question for the floor. I've never been to IKEA. Is there any possible way to justify a trip to IKEA as part of kindergarten shopping? If they actually stocked all those rainbow tie-dyed textiles that they show in the promotional picture, I could justify it in a heartbeat. LG is quite convinced that the well-supplied kindergartener needs tie-dyed bedclothes. But alas. They do not actually sell the tie-dyed bedclothes. Do they perhaps sell tie-dyed pencil boxes instead?