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Grocery Shopping with Children

In the 4 1/2 months I've been home I am forced to admit, I have only had one completely successful grocery shopping trip - yesterday, and that's because the shopping list was very short.

I can just imagine the snickers from other parents who do this...but I really do my best..but then things happen...I can't explain it.
Now, in my former, professional life, I could be on a conference call, doing instant message with a colleague and be working on a deliverable for my boss all at once, and still be able to respond to a question from the call or pick at something I heard without missing a beat. Foolishly, I assumed I would be able to transfer my focus and concentration to grocery shopping...I mean, surely, surely I could do this, right?

Yeah..well, I don't know what the issue is exactly, but it's different each time. First I made up my list, but then I would realize that I had already passed the aisle where the item was. For a parent trying to do a quick grocery run between nap and meal-time, those extra minutes spinning are agony. So I made up a new format - items roughly by aisle. That didn't prevent new mishaps from cropping up - I completely forgot items off my list - even though they were written down, I got the wrong thing in my haste (one time sugar-free maple syrup, another time it was sugar-free oatmeal). I have even bought the wrong thing...twice!! In my defense I blame it all on the shelf organization, designed to dupe inexperienced and completely stressed shoppers like myself, but to what purpose? I have no idea.

But I digress, I have forgotten to take my own cloth bags into the grocery, the ones that I expressly brought for groceries. I have also forgotten to give the cashier the coupons that I brought, the ones that I wanted to use that day because they were going to expire. I find them neatly tucked away in my bag when I get home and I am emptying my junk out.

And there's more. I have forgotten a bag of groceries, my receipt - each time having to be called back by an amused grocery attendant. I have misplaced my credit card and only realized it 2 days later, but found it after an anxious 30 minutes. I have also spent a good 10-15 minutes rolling the heavy shopping cart around the parking lot, with one hand, while holding the baby in the other, because I went down the wrong aisle and couldn't just walk over to the right one because of the divider. Aarrghh!

It is true to say that I approach each grocery trip with ambivalence now - will this be a successful trip? Or, is my secret, bad genie giggling somewhere at the prospect of tripping me up yet again?

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