Five Below #shop5B #Sponsored

This is a sponsored post for Five Below, through She Speaks. All opinions expressed are my own or that of my family.

The wind down has begun...after weeks of crazy fall sports schedules, this past week wrapped up the remaining fall sports. Of course, the break will be short lived, as we officially kicked off winter sports with our first swim meet of the season this weekend. During the wind down and the slow period that we can enjoy for the next few weeks, we have been taking advantage of the quiet evenings and weekends and getting out and doing things as a family.

The other weekend, because we had no sports and had a few errands to run on Friday night, we took the opportunity to stop at Five Below with the kids. Five Below is a family favorite shopping destination. Usually, we head there without a shopping list, but often times we choose Five Below when we are looking for a specific (and unique) item. I think part of the appeal to the family is just the unique collection of items that they offer and that they offer them all for $5 and below. It is a great place to pick up stocking stuffers and fun items for a white elephant gift exchange.

On this trip, since we came armed with an available budget and an intent to spend it, we spent longer than normal shopping. Everyone wanted to see what was available before making any commitments.

My daughter's first stop was at the plastic shoes. They offer both a lined and unlined version. She found a pink pair in her size and tried them on. Satisfied that they fit, they were the first item added to our cart.

My son headed to the back of the store and checked out the assortment of sports balls. They seem to have one for every sport. A few minutes were spent playing with the balls and deciding if we wanted one or another.

The giant tennis balls were a hit with the kids, but they opted to skip getting a ball and continued around the store.

With the release of the new Star Wars planned for this fall, the kids were excited to check out the vast assortment on Star Wars items that were available at Five Below.

In addition to those items, they also had some posters. The kids gave them a good review, looking for the best options to update the decorations in their bedroom.

Our next stop was in the office/art section. We looked for gift options for a birthday party my daughter was planning to attend. She settled on a sketch pad and a set of colored pencils for her friend. Then, she added in another sketch pad for herself and a dry erase calendar with magnets for her room. Then we found a photo clip pack that consisted of a string that could be mounted and several small clothes pins for attaching pictures. This was a solution I had been looking for to display my daughter's ribbons from swimming, so I added this to the cart.

Our next stop was at the phone/tablet accessory wall. Their selection in the tech area is diverse. They have covers for seemingly all brands/styles of phone and tablet with several colors, styles and themes to choose from. I think my personal favorite was the Lego cover where you could attach building bricks to further personalize the cover.

They also offer charging cables and headphones. My kids are required to bring a set to school, so we always keep a few on hand to replace the ones that get lost or the cords bent and stop working.

Then, we headed up to the candy section.

The selection, oh the selection! Suddenly, the cart started to fill faster. There were the theater boxes of candy...there were three or four varieties chosen. There was the wall of 10/$1 candy items. There were three or four bags filled with personalized assortments of candy. There were gummy bears and candy corn (shh! those were mine, all mine!).

Everything we bought was $1 - $5, in even dollars, except the candy corn which was priced at $1.79, which I found odd given the typical pricing that we saw in store.

Everyone was pleased with their purchases and we headed on to tackle our remaining errands and grab dinner, although I'm pretty certain that a couple of the 10 for $1 candy items might have been consumed on the way to dinner.

This is a sponsored post for Five Below, through She Speaks. All opinions expressed are my own or that of my family.