Jan Lau and Sabrina Sivongxay have two traditions on Thanksgiving.

After the two nurses gather with their respective families for a festive holiday lunch, they switch gears and get into their bargain-hunting mode.

For the two 39-year-old women, shopping has become as much of a Thanksgiving tradition as sharing a holiday meal with relatives.

That’s why Lau of Waikele and Sivongxay of Ewa Beach were first in line Thursday just outside the cosmetics area at Macy’s at Ala Moana Center, waiting for the store to open at 5 p.m. They were joined by Sivongxay’s niece, Michelle, 18.

“We love shopping,” Sivongxay said. She and Lau have been doing their holiday shopping routine for more than 10 years, though they’ve had to adjust their schedules because stores are opening earlier on Thanksgiving.

The two women were part of the throngs of shoppers at Ala Moana and other shopping sites around Oahu who had their sights set on deeply discounted merchandise as part of Black Friday sales — an important part of the retailing industry’s financial performance for the year.

Lau planned to hit the toy area at Macy’s first, while Sivongxay was heading straight for cosmetics.

The National Retail Federation expects an estimated 137.4 million U.S. consumers to shop this weekend, a slight increase from last year, with sales projected to grow 3.6 percent.

Like many holiday shoppers, though, Lau and Sivongxay are buying more of their holiday gifts online each year, so they didn’t expect to buy as much or stay out as late Thursday as they have in the past.

Four or five years ago, when Sivongxay’s son, Jon, joined them for the first time, they didn’t get home until about 4 a.m.

“I hated it,” Jon, 19, said Thursday as he waited outside Ala Moana’s Disney Store, four hours before its 8 p.m. opening.

Jon, who was first in line at the Disney outlet, just as he was last year, said he has come to enjoy the bargain- hunting tradition.

“It’s actually fun,” he said.

Lau said they brave the crowds and traffic because shopping for bargains in person, rather than online, “is part of the feeling and the hype” around Black Friday. “It’s just the excitement.”

Lau’s husband, Chris, likely doesn’t feel the same way. He was back at home, watching football, with their two daughters and relatives, she said.

Unlike when the two women first started their holiday shopping tradition more than a decade ago, the parking situation at Ala Moana was not nearly as tight.

Less than an hour before Macy’s opened, many parking spaces in a nearby structure were empty.

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Correction: >> Sabrina Sivongxay is the aunt of Michelle Sivongxay, not her mother, as was reported in an earlier version of this story and in Friday’s print edition.