We needed a Costco shop pretty badly, and this morning, I thought I might take the kids and take care of it. I admit, while my kids are excellent shopping companions, I found myself a bit gun shy. I don’t think I’ve taken all four of them out on my own since we began our three month bout of sickness, which began like FIVE months ago! Its been a very long time. So I thought about it, and put it off, and then finally figured Brady and I would likely do it over the weekend anyway. We love family errand days, as you all know.
But when I chatted with Brady at 11:00, I found out he works this Saturday! I know we talked about it a while ago, but I had completely lost track of the dates, and had no idea it was tomorrow. I’ll admit it put me in a pretty crummy mood. I’m fine with Brady working some Saturdays. I remember saying I was fine with this setup. But I forgot, and it caught me off guard, and bummed me out. It also kind of kicked my “errand day” plan in the butt. So I gathered up every shred of positivity I could and told the kids we were going to head to the city for a grocery shop, directly over nap time. I know. I was asking for it.
But guys, they did awesome! I tried to take a selfie of us but it was just a total fail, haha!
I couldn’t fit us all in!! Not at all! I know I’ve made it work before, and I think I took it from above, but whatever. It was funny. They all thought so, too. And I got a good Dekker snuggle out of the deal. Can’t complain about that!
Our first stop in Costco was the electronics department. This is how that conversation went.
Excuse me, do you have phone charger cords?
For what?
…phones?
uuuuuhhh, ya I think so. (stares)
Iphones? I have an iphone.
Oh, ok, ya, over here.
I don’t know, guys, I found it funny. Got that and kept moving.
We stopped at the bakery, and the kids got cookies. Can I just say, I’m so thankful that my kids aren’t as observant as I am yet. This one specific woman in the bakery area must just hate passing the cookies out. We’ve come across here in this setting before, and its always the same. My kids stand still, waiting patiently, and when she approaches, they ask “May I have a cookie, please?” She doesn’t even look at them, and passes me three cookies. I thank her, and the kids say “thank you,” and she just walks away. Never makes eye contact with them once. I don’t know. That just puts me off. If she dislikes interacting with people (or children) so obviously, have someone else do it. Whatever. I digress. The kids got gingersnaps, and were thrilled about the amount of sugar they were coated in. So we were good to go!
We picked up our bakery stuff, and our milk, and went for the few aisle things. I bought more of that passion tea concentrate, because its SO good! And I bought an unreasonable amount of ritz bits because they were on sale. We didn’t hit up too many samples, but we came across a lady with apple sauce, so we stopped for that one. As we were perusing the aisles in search of mustard (does Costco not carry mustard??) Dekker whispered to me “We should buy flowers for Laela.”
Now, Dekker asks to buy flowers for me almost every time we go to Costco. On one hand, we often tell him that we can’t, because he has to learn that he can’t just spend money frivolously, but we also LOVE that he wants to buy something for someone else, and I love the chivalry aspect of it, too. He never suggests flowers for him, and then asks for something for himself, so I think he’s catching on. But today, he asked for Laela, which was new. I agreed that we should, and he picked out a bouquet of purple tulips, which was just perfect. Springtime in her favorite color.
After we got the flowers, we headed to the till. I was wearing Solly, which makes unloading bigger, awkward things even more awkward, but thankfully, it was pretty quiet at the time, and the guy who loads carts helped me unload everything. He was completely taken by Solly, and mentioned how big he was. It surprised me a little bit, because not many men bring that sort of topic up with me. So we got to talking about how Solly was born big, and how he himself was also born big. He commented on how I was such a small woman, and asked how big my husband was. I told him my husband was juuust bigger than he was, hahaha! Conversation over. It cracked me up 🙂 But I got my stuff and the five of us headed out.
Do the Costco receipt checker guys draw on your receipts for your kids? Our kids LOVE that. Laela got to carry the receipt today, and when she handed it to the man, he crouched down and drew the smiley face so she could watch. She was excited, and squealed her “thank you” before we headed back to the van. It was sweet.
While we walked back to our vehicle, Dekker asked me completely out of the blue “How will baby Theo come to Jesus if he didn’t ask him into his heart?” It kind of thrilled my soul and broke my heart at the same time. I am still unabashedly missing the baby that we lost, but I am SO happy that Dekker is obviously thinking about everything, processing, and asking questions. Just this morning, he had asked me why the ultrasound picture of Theo that we have on our fridge doesn’t have arms or legs. So many good, big questions. But asking about Theo going to heaven brought up a great conversation about babies coming from God, and how Jesus in already in their hearts before they’re old enough to know to choose him. We talked about how God is compassionate, and that he would definitely bring the baby back to heaven to be with Him. Dekker thought on it for a bit, and confirmed that, since he had accept Jesus into his heart, that he would get to meet Theo still, one day. I said he would, and he was content with that. My mama heart just swells for my children.
Once the van was packed full of kids and food, we decided to go bring Brady a coffee at his work. That way, coffee would be had and hopefully the little boys would sleep a little. Success was had all around. Coffee was drank, and the little boys napped a bit, and everyone was happy upon arriving home. First order of business was getting Laela’s beautiful flowers into a vase. I had some wonderful helpers.
Like my choice of vase? If only my other ones weren’t all packed up in the garage…
Since getting home, I’ve put the little boys down for naps, because thank goodness, they were still tired. The big ones are watching some VeggieTales, and I’ve got my feet up, doing this. Brady is on his way home now. We’ll all be together soon, and then we’ll indulge in a hot dog supper. We had hot dogs pretty recently but the kids LOVED them, which was weirdly not the case last year. For some reason, hot dogs make me feel more springy. Just wait until we can get good watermelon and eat supper outside! Eek!
All in all, its been a lovely day. I’m really glad that I ventured out after all. It was a lovely reminder of what a treat my kids are to be around, and also that I am a capable mom even when I feel weak.
In all seasons of life, to GOD be the glory!