shopping with children -- the husband edition

so, i do about 95% of the shopping for our household, for the things that we use everyday from food to clothing. and i pretty much only shop before rest time, cuz the rest of the day is pretty unpredictable. if it's not done before 3pm (preferable 2pm) then it doesn't need to be done. my husband takes care of all the outdoor and home repair stuff. but every once in a while he decides that we all need to go to the store together for whatever we need. usually it's a big lots shopping spree, but tonight it was a trip to target. after dinner at the restaurant (eat n' park *smile*)

now, i love target. they've got the big carts with 2 seats for bigger kids, and that's awesome! i'm all about confinement for my 2 little ones. and when we got there, i found an appropriate cart and got them both strapped in, and they started whining about getting out. i'm a firm believer in confinement, but my husband told them that if they were good they could get out. i stopped to check out the jewelry (for inspiration *smile*) and the next thing i knew, they were both out of the cart, and the madness began!

i really don't know what he was thinking. our children have not yet grasped the concept of looking with your eyes and not your hands. they don't understand that we need to use our inside voices when we're inside. they don't understand that they can't just go look at something just cuz they want to, even if we're not going over there. they want to look at what they want, and not what's on mommy's list. hence the need for confinement. but my husband's got isabelle on his shoulders and alexander by the hand, and they're both talking a mile a minute while i push this ginormous cart that's completely empty. i found everything on my list while he went to look at bikes and toys and whatnot, and was forced to explain that they both already have bikes, so we're not taking the princess tricycle home. did i mention the need for confinement? *smile* by the time we were ready to check out, he was ready to leave them both in the store. it was after 9pm -- past their bedtime on a late night -- and we were both frazzled. they were both jazzed by being up late, even though they didn't get any popcorn, and they wanted to sing all the way home. needless to say, they're both asleep and i think my husband is too. they're exhausting on a regular day, but let us try something new and different, and i need an adult beverage! maybe next time he'll remember why they need to be confined in the store!

i am not a hoarder -- i just like to have a lot of stuff *smile*

my husband is convinced that i'm a hoarder, just becuz when we started dating i had piles of stuff and paths through my apartment. i'm really not. i just have issues with getting rid of things. and i like to acquire things. my current acquisitional obsession is beads and my online store of choice is lima beads. they're awesome! they're having a month-long sale where they posted a crossword puzzle at the beginning of the month and every day's clue tells you what's on sale. you could print out the crossword puzzle and do it ahead of time so that you knew which days to shop. it's been really amazing and really bad at the same time. their prices are awesome and the quality of stuff is awesome, so i've been doing a lot of shopping lately. good thing i've got a major project i'm working on where i need a variety of product, cuz i've got a huge variety of beads now *smile*.

beads are really the only thing i'm collecting at the moment. i've really let go of my shoe collection, cuz i've realized that i only wear my heels at church and the rest of the time i rotate between 3 pairs of birkenstock. and with clothes, i donate regularly to my church's rummage sale so that i have space to replace. i do a lot of shopping at the rummage sale as well. i like to help out, cuz then you get to shop ahead of the actual sale and get all the good stuff. and i figure that if i'm paying "full" price, then it's all good (but is there ever really a way to justify $3 as full price for a suit or suede jacket? *smile*)

shopping with children--not for the faint of heart...

...at least not with my kids *smile*. my sister & mom can really appreciate this, since they've shopped with me recently, but alexander especially likes to push the envelope. he's almost 4 and likes to make sure that the boundaries are still firmly in place. i swear! but today was the icing on the cake. i just wanted the floor to open up and swallow me! *smile*

we had to go shopping today becuz they needed new pj's and isabelle needs pants (which is another story altogether *smile*). so we went to the mall with our friends kellie & clare & erin. gymboree was fine. children's place was okay. lunch was showing signs of needing a nap. so when we got to burlington i knew that i had no hope of keeping them in the stroller. fine. we found some jeans for isabelle and found some pj's for both of them and we're checking out. i know that my time is limited. even though i didn't force alexander to stay in the stroller the whole time, i knew that he was at the end of his rope, patience-wise. but he flips out while we're putting on our jackets to leave and knocks over my bottle of water, spilling water all over the place. i desperately wanted to thwack him in the back of the head, but i'm well aware of all the eyes on me. sheesh! i really just wanted the floor to open up and swallow me! when i was childless i used to look at those mothers with the uncontrollable children with pity and think about what poor mothers they were. clearly, if they were better mothers, they would have more control over their children and they'd be well behaved like my brother, sister and i were. how little did i know *smile*. but i was proud of myself, becuz even though i was embarrassed to the soles of my feet, i did what i would have done at home, and once he calmed down a bit, i took him out of the stroller and made him help me clean up the mess. i was so angry, but helping to clean up helped me to calm down, too, so that by the time we were done i wasn't afraid that i'd have to kill my child (don't call cys*smile*).

of course both of them are asleep now, and i have a moment to breathe before i have to deal with them again. thankfully there are still some things that isabelle doesn't follow in her brother's footsteps in. she flips out, but not as regularly and not as extremely. although until i saw her have a temper tantrum, i didn't think that children really threw themselves down on the ground kicking and screaming like you see on tv. the first time i saw her do that, i just looked at her and told her that when she was ready to settle down and behave like a sane, rational human being that i'd be in the living room. i had to leave cuz i was gonna laugh! amazing!

my love of shoes

i love shoes. at one point in time i had over 100 pairs of shoes, most of them black. i've really downsized in recent years, mainly becuz my husband refuses to dedicate as much storage space as i'd really like. and he keeps asking questions like "why do you need all these shoes? you don't even wear them. don't you have a pair of black shoes like those?" clearly he's a man, and will never understand my need for blue reptile print leather pumps *smile*

but i think i've passed my love of shoes (some would say addiction *smile*) on to my children. alexander really only has 1 pair of shoes--tennis shoes--that he wears constantly. but he does have a pair that he wears to church at Easter & Christmas (and whenever we're at grandma's house for mass *smile*) but he needed a new pair cuz they didn't fit. we were at a fabulous resale shop called once upon a child where i take their "gently used" clothing and get cash to buy them "new" clothing. while we were there, i found not 1, not 2, but 3 pairs of stacy adams in his size. anyone who doesn't know who stacy adams is has never bought fabulous mens shoes. they're right up there with florsheims. i didn't even know they made stacy adams for boys! i was so excited. and i found the most adorable pair of rain boots for isabelle. she wanted to carry them home herself.

so today, we're watching lightening mcqueen, and they both want to put on their new shoes. and alexander is tap-dancing in the kitchen on the hardwood floor (i don't know where he got that from *smile*) and asked me if he can wear his new shoes to bed *smile*. a boy after my own heart *smile*