Normally, I take one child and we run our grocery errands at night after dinner. It's quality time with that child and we talk a lot, especially about our special memories together. I don't enjoy grocery shopping at all, but I do enjoy the quality time together.Well, recently, due to poor planning and procrastination, I've had twice when I needed to go grocery shopping during the day, which means all the kids go with me. I was gearing up for it the way you'd prepare for an ice storm. That is, I was dreading it. As it turns out, it was just fine. It makes a huge difference when your youngest are 3 years old, apparently. They were much better at following the rules and having good attitudes. (Lydia did throw 3 fits, I should mention, but I was able to talk her out of it and we kept going. We didn't have to leave the store & start over, thank goodness!) We went to Sprout's, WalMart, and the bakery. We had 30+ grocery bags when it was all over. Thankfully, I have 6 able helpers to get it all put away in record time.
We're not going to fit into our retro-fitted minivan much longer. For now, we have skinny kids and it works. But there may come a time when we'll need to seat more than just six kids. ;)
13 comments:
I too, don't like shopping with the kiddos. But in our current life stage, that's the only way ut works, if we ever want to all be together when Daddy's home. Looks like you had a friend with you, too. In my opinion, that's the way to go. Find another person to share the adventure with and it makes it more fun.
Kendra and I used to run errands together. We'd park our vans next to each and take turns running into stores. She'd stay with the gang while I picked up dry cleaning. Then I'd stay while she went into the bank. We'd make a day of it broken up with a trip to a park, or the playland at the mall. Everyone was tired at the end but that just made for great naps!
And when might this "there may come a time" be, I wonder?.....
You're so smart! Organized! Clever! Creative! You do so much better with six that I did with two! I've said it before and I'll say it again, "I wish you had been my mentor when I was bringing up you and Jamie!"
Serendipitiously, I really enjoy your link to ClustrMaps and I hope your readers click on it to be amazed as I am at the breadth of your readership! WOW! That's quite a long list of countries.
I have several coworkers who enjoy your blog as much as I do. I'm so proud of you, Ginger!!
Wow!! If I can get compliments like that for a post that's all about my procrastination, I'll admit to my faults much more readily!
You do look organized! Who took the picture, may I ask?
When we go shopping (every Thursday) we hit two or three stores. Today was Petsmart and Costco. I have mine walk behind me two-by-two unless a store is quite empty, then they may walk however they want to. They know to stay close. I haven't any runners.
We taught them to quickly line up by age behind a parent, littles first, back to bigs, when we can "FALL IN!". It was made a game, but works well in the store when we begin to get wider than we are long. ;)
Are you aware that your precious littles are not buckled correctly? :)
Kyle was with me one of the times this happened. He took the pic. I was done in 2 hours both times. Have no desire to make it an all day affair, even with good friends. lol
That's funny, Momma. Cute idea!
Catherine, do tell.
I shop individually with each kid just like you do. I also do not like to grocery shop at all so doing it with one child and spending that one on one time makes it seem like more fun. It was my youngests turn tonite. He wanted to ride in the cart and at 6 there is hardly any room for food.
Sounds like more kids for the Clark family? That would be awesome!
The red part on the side of the seat is meant for the seat belt to be guided through. It assures proper placement of the seat belt across their little frames and offers more security in case of a crash. :)
Yeah, I used to use that thing all the time until I realized the seatbelt was at the same level regardless. But that's easy enough to fix. :)
I had to show my husband the picture of your kids in the van because now that we have our 6th child, my husband cannot fit in the van anymore, since we don't have a middle for the middle seat (we have captain's chairs by the doors). It takes me about 10 minutes to buckle in kids into 4 car seats because the fit is SO TIGHT. I have "healthy" teenage girls and they each have a hard time fitting in the back seat between 2 car seats. I don't know why they didn't make the seat back there accomodate a size 10 bottom in ladies pants! LOL
For grocery shopping either my husband goes with our teenage girls or I take all of the kids, which happens more often lately. I wear the newborn, and we push 2 or 3 carts. I have a 1 year old and 11 month old in one cart, a 2 year old and groceries in another cart, and then the 3rd cart if we need it just holds groceries and those big boxes of diapers because I have 4 in diapers now. It really isn't hard. But I know once of these days when they start walking I am going to have to retrain them like I trained my teenagers years ago when they were littles. The rule was if they let go of the cart while we were walking, they had to sit in it. Honestly, without my teenage girls I couldn't shop by myself and push 3 carts. I can push one and pull one but when they get filled up it is hard to maneuver.
Funny how not very many of the respondents did not catch on to your bigger van comment.
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