Every mom has her weakness. There’s always one area that just doesn’t come naturally, even if other moms make it look like a cakewalk. Mine happens to be grocery shopping.
For me, grocery shopping with my children is almost always a memorable experience, and often, that’s not a good thing. Usually, I go by myself or only take one of my three little men with me at a time; I call it the “One or None” policy. It’s easier; plus, when I’m shopping for a family of five and my cart is already full of young children, the prospects of a positive outcome are dismal, at best. In fact, juggling Ginsu knives blindfolded has better odds of going well. I learned this the hard way.
Once, when my husband was on a business trip, I had to take my two eldest sons shopping with me. At the time, they were 3 and 1 1/2 years old, and I was five months pregnant. In hindsight, shopping before the hubz took off for a week-long convention on the other side of the country would have been a grand idea, but situations are always clearer when you’re looking back.
Anyway, I had just gotten off work and had picked the boys up from daycare. I thought we’d make a quick trip to the Super Walmart, so we’d only have to make one stop for everything we needed. Simple enough, right? Yeah, I wish.
My first mistake was the time of day I took them. They were riled up from being away from me all day, and were used to getting a snack right away. Hungry, energetic kids at a giant box store…yeah, not my best idea. As soon as we got there, the whining began. “I’m hunnngggrrryy!”
My second mistake? Cutting through the ladies lingerie section to speed things up. I was already in the refrigerator section, trying to grab things as quickly as possible when I noticed some folks chuckling a little further down the aisle. I figured they were laughing at me because my son was in the midst of proclaiming as loudly as possible that I “never” give him anything to eat, but I was wrong. The laughter stemmed from my younger boy spinning a pink, lace thong above his head like a lasso, before trying to put them on.
It was then (as I grabbed the thong in complete embarrassment) when I noticed that not only had my son removed and tossed his shoes somewhere, but his brother shouted, “Those underswears are a lots smaller than yours underswears.” Awesome.
I quickly threw some quick meals into the cart, retraced my steps to find the missing shoes…and then headed to the checkout. By the time we made it back to the car, I was completely humiliated. Looking back, I’m not even sure how it all happened with me right there, but then again, isn’t that always the case? Since then, my “One or None” shopping policy has been strictly enforced unless my husband is with me. I don’t know how supermoms do it on a regular basis.
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