Everyone these days is offering fun reusable shopping bags for sale. So what makes one reusable bag different from the next?

For starters:

Colors

Shapes

Sizes

Compactability

Durability

Flat-bottomed
 

In the end, it all comes down to personal choice. For example, the most important features to me are a larger than normal size that also compacts small (or at least perfectly flat). Bonus points if it can stand open on its own, thanks to a flat bottom -- similar to a paper sack. My new favorite is the Walmart reusable shopping bag.
 

GOOD NEWS!  Walmart is hosting a 1Million Reusable Bag Giveaway. That's right, on Saturday, April 19, 2008 Walmart will be giving away one million custom-made reusable shopping bags -- beginning at 8AM Local Time and while supplies last.

 
For the record, in addition to large reusable bags like these, I also like to have a couple of reusable shopping bags that pack up really small -- so they're easy to carry with you. (The larger ones -- like the Walmart bag -- I keep in the car.)

Here are some fun reusable shopping bags and places to find them...

When Jim and I were on our 2-week RV adventure in July, we took a side-trip to a couple of malls.

Shocker! I dislike malls almost as much as Jim does. But we both felt that it wouldn't have been right to pass both malls on this particular trip and not stop in to see what all the talk is about.

Here are the highlights from my visit to the two largest malls in the world...

Well, Martha Stewart has made my day!

Not only did she and her staff recommend Kiehl's for their generous free sampling program (in the March 2007 issue of Real Simple), but they also recommend Sephora for similar reasons.

Sephora stores offer generous samples from the more than 150 cosmetics lines they carry. Just ask and a salesperson will hand you a packaged sample or fill jars with requested products for free."

Sounds good to me!

I read this in Real Simple magazine (March 2007):

Kiehl's hands out samples of every product it sells -- approximately 10 million giveaways a year."

Woah! I did not know that.

I had an interesting conversation with the manufacturer of ChoiceDek and MoistureShield -- which are two of the leading composite deck materials on the market today.

The manufacturer is Advanced Environmental Recycling Technologies (AERT).

The rep who answered my phone call got to play "20 Questions" with me. Fortunately, he was a good sport, and he was willing to tackle any question I sent his way -- even when it wasn't specifically related to his product(s).

This guy definitely went above and beyond to be helpful to me in my decision to go with composite decking in our new log home, or not.

One interesting thing that I learned had to do with the differences between buying home improvement supplies at places like Home Depot and Lowe's, compared to buying from local distributors and the manufacturer's own list of suppliers.

As many of you know, we chose not to renew our Sam's Club membership this year.

Not for any particular reason, other than the fact that we were driving a bit out of the way to take advantage of was I used to call "madhouse shopping".

It really wasn't that bad... it just got old. And after being dues-paying members of the legendary Sam's Club for well over a decade, we began to lose sight of the real "benefits".

Fast-forward 5 months later, and we find ourselves dues-paying members of Costco now!

Here's why...

According to Consumer Reports (December, 2005), "retailing powerhouses Best Buy, Circuit City, and Wal-Mart, where much of America shops for electronics, may not be where you should buy electronics."

...Huh?

Saw this the other day when I was at Home Depot...

A bunch of kids taking part in a Home Depot Kids Workshop in Franklin, Tennessee.

Two of my most recent shopping discoveries have been the Kohl's online department store and Goodwill retail stores (& online auction sites).

Here's why I like them...