Why My Kids Don't Accompany Me To The Grocery Store

I was getting my list ready for my weekly trip to the grocery store earlier today.  My son, curious, asked me what I was writing.  Upon telling him, he immediately started saying he wanted to go to the store with me.  I had planned on going later in the day, once Anthony was up so that he could at least watch my daughter, if not both kids.  I have more recently started taking my son with me on short trips.  He's generally well behaved and he likes to throw items into the cart for me.  My daughter was being pretty cranky, I wasn't entirely sure I wanted to take her with me.  What can I say, I'm a glutton for punishment. 

It's been a rare occasion for my daughter to come with me to the store.  But babies learn by experiencing new sites, sounds, and smells.  I began to feel like I was robbing her of something.  So today I decided I need to be like all those other "super moms" I see at the store and bring both kids with me.  It would prove to be one of my more questionable decisions of the day.

When we got there, my son wanted one of the race car carts.  It has two seats, so this way they could both ride in the cart together.  It seemed like a good idea.  My shopping trip was going great for about 1 minute.  My daughter didn't want to sit in the cart;  she wanted to be held, which made her start to cry.  If you have heard her cry, you would know that her cry is shrill, and loud, and she sounds like you are torturing her.  Once she began crying, my son started yelling (quite loudly I might add), "You have to hold her, you have to hold her!"  He apparently didn't want to hear her crying anymore than anyone else in the store.  I think back to my days before kids.  When I used to see people like me in the store with their kids I would think, "Can't you control you kids?" or "Why aren't you doing anything to make your kid stop crying?".  I was young and naive, and it's easy to judge when you don't have kids and haven't been in that situation.  I'm pretty sure this is my payback for all those horrible thoughts I had towards people way back then.

So anyways, as long as the cart was moving, they were both happy.  But the moment I stopped to pick up anything to put in the cart, she would burst into tears and my son would start yelling "Keep going!  Turn this way!"  Not long into our trip, I decided I had no choice but to hold her.

Have you ever pushed one of those large race car carts?  If you have, then you would know how large and awkward they are, and how hard they are to steer!  So imagine trying to hold a baby and steer one of these things with one hand.  Not an easy task!  After a while of this I decided to set her on the ledge of the cart, this way she could face me.  I think your purse is intended to go in this spot.  Whatever it is for, it's not intended for children as there are no safety belts.  I just kept my hand on her and picked her up whenever I stepped away from the cart.  It seemed to work.

Before we left the house, I had asked my son if he needed to use the bathroom.  He said no.  Then I reminded him of how hard it would be to get to a bathroom at the store but he insisted he didn't have to go.  We were almost done with the trip, finally making progress when we passed the restrooms at the back of the store.  Upon seeing them, he starts yelling, "I have to pee!  I have to pee!".  There was a part of me that wanted to ask, "Do you really have to go?" or "Can't you hold it?".  But you spend so much time potty training them and telling them how important it is to tell you when they have to go, I knew I shouldn't do that.  Annoyed, I scooped up my daughter and my purse, and then somehow managed to lift my son out of the cart.

Once in the restroom, our only option was the handicap stall, since it was the only one that would fit all of us.  Once in there, I didn't see a diaper changing station to set my daughter on (though I later realized it had a tiny seat you could buckle small children into), so against my better judgement, I set her on the floor.  Then, turning around to tend to my son, I found him playing with a plunger and asking "What IS this?".  I pulled his pants down and was about to set him on the seat when I realize the toilet seat is gross.  But what was I going to do now?  We weren't all going to fit into another stall and his pants were already down.  So I wiped the seat off as best I could and let him pee.  (Let me just say, he did actually go...but barely.  It was definitely NOT a dire situation.  He merely wanted to mess around in the bathroom.  I was not happy!)  After he was done and I pulled his pants up, I turned around to see my daughter basically rolling around on the floor.  As we left the stall my son started asking about washing hands.  I wasn't about to attempt getting all of us washed up.  So I got everyone back to the cart and gave everyone hand sanitizer.  It was the simplest solution.  It's moments like these that I wonder why I want more children.  But what can I say?  I am a glutton for punishment.

We finally got checked out, picked up our groceries, and unloaded them at home.  From start to finish (from the time I leave to the time I get back and put my groceries away), it usually takes me about 20 minutes.  It took us an hour.  At the end of it all, I'm pretty sure my duaghter neither enjoyed or appreciated the new experience.

This is an example of why I don't take kids to the store with me.  I'm glad there are "super moms" out there who can manage a hand full of kids at the store and have everything under control.  I, apparently, am not one of them.  I definitely have a new found appreciation for my mom who took all four of us kids to the store with her on a regular basis.