Brave or Insane?

Today was my three-week checkup at the doctor's office. Can you believe it? Three weeks already!

Since Bob was at work, I had to load up all three kids and go to the appointment with them, all alone. No support team!

I got everyone dressed, no problem. It only took two hours!
I started with myself. A shower for me thank you! Then Benjamin woke up and got changed, fed and dressed. Then Elizabeth woke up and picked out her own outfit. I vetoed it and found her something that was less insane. I mean really. Pink jeans and a Fourth of July tank top...that's borderline crazy cat lady insane.
Eventually Dylan decided to wake up and it was his turn.
Dressing and changing Dylan is usually trouble. He's a runner and he enjoys nudity. So. Yeah. That was a bit of a struggle.
Then he cried because HE was ready to go but WE collectively were not as ready and he is very impatient.

We all got into the car happily and drove away.

Once we got to the doc's office, I unloaded Elizabeth first, then got the baby out, then unbuckled Dylan. He immediately starting hollering that he wanted "pops" and I still have no idea what he meant by that.
I told him we'd get "pops" later and tried to bribe him into the office with the promise of looking at the fishtank.
He draped himself on the sidewalk. I yanked him up and walked him to the office door. Elizabeth opened it for us and we all walked into the little glass entry room.
Dylan sat down and refused to go through the next door into the actual office.
Elizabeth ran into the waiting room to check out Nemo.
I opened the door for myself, Ben and Dylan and had to kick lovingly scoot Dylan through the door with my foot. He then promptly laid down on the floor right inside the door and started howling.

fun fun fun!

He did that for the whole five minutes we waited, jumping up to act normally just 30 seconds before the nurse called us to go back to the exam room.

He DID wait nicely and patiently while mommy got weighed. He usually runs away. And he even held hands and walked down the hallway to the exam room nicely. I was surprised.

We passed by my OB on the way and he said, "Wow mom! You're brave!"
I said, "I have no other options!"

The appointment went by quickly too, just a check on the incision to make sure I'm not oozing or whatever. I'm not. I actually checked it myself a couple days ago, it looks pretty good.

I was so encouraged by Dylan's great behavior (minus the whole having to kick him through the door situation) that I actually decided to take them all to Safeway to get some things that Bob forgot to get on his last shopping trip, aka, they weren't in the soda and chips aisle.

The Safeway trip started out great! Elizabeth sat IN the cart, Dylan got the baby seat up front and I held Ben in my left hand and pushed the cart with my right. I sometimes would use my foot to turn better or to get the cart going faster. I am a shopping cart sensei. I think I was moving it with my mind actually. Like Yoda.

Anyway. We got apples and strawberries and other fresh foods. We got tuna and cheddar cheese for tonight's dinner (Tuna Noodle Casserole, delish). We got SpongeBob and Disney Princess fruit snacks. Mommy got some Shiraz. I earned it.

We got up to the checkout area and all hell broke loose. Dylan refused to let go of his box of fruit snacks, which was really fine since we got two of the same kind.
Then I refused the "would you like help out with this?" SOOOO stupid!
Ben, who I was still holding, started fussing and rooting around. He tried to latch onto my arm. Not fun.

I paid hastily and got them out to the car, which I left unlocked both for ease of reloading the children and incentive to thieves to steal my piece of crap car. It wasn't stolen. Dang!
Ben went in first. He was hysterical. Rooting around, obviously starving.
Dylan went next. He had a mouthful of fruit snacks and kept yelling "Da babeeez ka-why-in!!!"
Yeah, Dylan, everyone within two miles of here knows that!

Somehow I loaded up the trunk with groceries and got Elizabeth into her carseat. Ben still screaming, we drove off.
He thankfully was soothed by the driving and stopped crying two seconds out of the parking lot. Nothing is more frazzling than driving while a baby screams!

Once we got home, I unloaded kids and groceries, fed Ben and he went to sleep. The older kids played outside with bubbles and then came in to watch "SpongeBob" naturally.
I even got Dylan's room picked up, finally!

Now the house is pretty quiet, but whew, what a trip!

So you tell me, brave or insane? Or both?

I want my two dollars!*

Last night I went to Safeway, without the kids, after Bob came home from work. I went *after* dinner, so I wouldn't buy Ho-Hos and eat half the box while pretending to comparison shop in the meat department.

I was going just for meat, bread, dairy and produce. I did the middle aisle shopping at the vastly cheaper Wal-Mart Supercenter earlier that day WITH the children. $140 worth of Wal-Mart snacks, juice, pastas and canned foods later...I still needed the essentials...meat, cheese, milk...you know...

Bob, gracious as he is, said I could go after dinner to Safeway for the rest. Hmrph. <= that's the sound of disdain.

I was glad to get away from the house and the kids, so I hightailed it out of here!

It was soooo nice to not have screaming children kicking me and each other the whole trip through the store.
While in the produce section, I took the time to look through their little vegetable reference book. I wanted to see just what the heck people DO with rhubarb. Turns out, not much! It is pretty though.

After about 45 minutes shopping I was done. Noone begged for soda, donuts or ANYTHING SpongeBob wheeeeeeeeeeeeze! Wheeze=Please in Dylanese.

The kid at the checkout was OBVIOUSLY very new to the store as I had purchased eight of the exact same item and instead of going 8 X into the register and scanning it once, he scanned EACH one individually.
He also had *issues* with the packages of stew meat as two would not scan and two would. So he scanned those two twice.
Ugh. It's meat dude. All different prices.

I went to the customer service desk...which they really should rename Vice Counter...it's all cigs and lottery tickets. Bad.
I told the gal of my meat package scanning dilemma. She rescanned the items and said, "actually, if I do it right, you owe me a dime."
I said "Thanks for your time" and left.
I didn't have a dime.
It was as though she never asked for the dime.
"Didn't ask for a dime."
Sorry.

Being the skeptical sort I am, I re-added up the meat packages in my car after loading the groceries up. I'll be damned, she was right. Now I feel like I need to drop a dime (hee hee) somewhere in that store, just to even it up.

When I got home, Dylan was in a poopy diaper, his room was thrashed and Bob was watching TV, oblivious.
We had a smidge of an argument about why he SHOULD in fact change a diaper now and then.
After the argument I laid in bed and had two or three hours of contractions, leading me to think that I should not yell about poo anymore, as it clearly upsets the new baby. :) And the old babies too.

Elizabeth kept running by me while I *discussed* things with Bob and saying "Smile! Smile!"
There has to be a better way to get him to change diapers. Clearly my strategy of being a raging beeyotch when he doesn't is NOT working.
Smile!

*This post has nothing to do with two dollars.

A three-year-old's shopping list

I just asked Elizabeth what she thinks we need to get from the grocery store.
Here's her list, verbatim:

Mashed potatoes
Potatoes
Fruit snacks
and Dylan's spray

I said, "Dylan's spray? You mean candy spray?"

"Yeah, candy spray. A boy one."

We might get a few other things too.