Just a quick trip to the grocery store...NOT!!!

Are you ready for a novel? Grab some popcorn, you're gonna be here for a while if you stick with this post until the end. So picture this--it's an overcast day here in Utah with the wind blowing a bit giving me the impression that it's too cold to go outside. And then there's yesterday--Albertson's adds come in the mail, usually I throw them away but there was something that caught my eye and sure enough led me to decide that this is where I'm going to do my grocery shopping. They have there 10 for $10 stuff and I was hooked on cereal being only $1 a box. So when Tyler wakes up from his nap, we eat lunch and I decide to venture out with the two kids by myself. You might be asking yourself, why not do it in the evening when hubby is home? Well, I was going to have vb plans, but come to find out the weather cancelled that activity. So my upcoming struggle was for naught, and now, instead of doing grocery shopping by myself I get to be home with a toddler refusing to stay in her room for bedtime and screaming once again at the top of her lungs. All right, here we go, back to the story. When we get to the grocery store--there is no race car cart that Elina loves to ride in, so we have to take the regular Joe cart for this particular trip. So Tyler's carseat sits up top and Elina rides in the base. Well you can imagine, with cereal and a bunch of other things I'd mapped out to get--everything starts to get full fast within the cart so I am forced to take Elina out. She does okay for the first 30 sec. and then it's disaster. We get to the end of the isle and she sees all the mothers day balloons--big ones for that matter. So she grabs the big one and is off galavanting (did I spell that right?)through the store and isles with me on her heels trying to maneuver a huge heavy cart full of food and my baby. In the back of my mind I recalled my last trip to Target where, in a similar scenario, I was chasing Elina through the aisles and had a grandma yell at me for leaving my baby unattended while attempting to fetch my toddler--hence the chasing Elina around with the full cart of food. Meanwhile, Tyler has had it with being in his carseat so I have to take him out and hold him to get him to be quiet and am now maneuvering with only one hand. So I decide to give her one more chance, asking her to stay by me as we go down the soda aisle (which mind you is in the middle of the store). Give her about .5 sec and she is off. But now that I'm holding Tyler I can't run/bounce as fast as I normally would to catch her--but I can leave the cart. However, she is all of a sudden faster than a rocket. So she is just laughing and laughing because this is such a fun game for her and I finally catch up with her in the bakery/produce. I'm getting more and more frustrated, and there is still so much more to get--so I take Tyler's car seat out and stick her up top to sit down. After screaming at me for about 5 min., she accepts her fate and we continue. So now I have a cart full of food, car seat on top of the food, toddler seated, baby in arms and I'm trying to maneuver this cart of probably 100 lbs with one hand, which is very difficult mind you to turn. So I finally get some momentum, only to realize that I don't have control in using only one arm and almost take out this poor lady who wanted some yogurt. I now realize that this isn't going to work--and decide it's best to pull the cart from the front. Well there was something sharp which I didn't see of course which cuts my finger. So now, with blood gushing (ok, so it was really like a paper cut--but still bleeding), sweat pouring from my head from this unexpected workout, cart full of food, car seat on top of food, toddler seated, baby in arms and hour and a half later--- I've had it. By now I don't even care how much money I save, I'm just ready to get out of the **** store!!! I really think that is the ploy of the grocery store--the longer they get you to stay there, the more you spend and the more you are just ready to get out of there. So I get to the register...maybe you'll consider this to be some good news in spite of all of this-- I never expected to spend over $100 in food and actually be told that I saved more than I spent! Go figure--this in a small way makes up for the absolute nightmare of a grocery store experience. And now typing this long novel has taken its toll on my poor paper cut finger and the pain makes it so I am unable to continue. So until next time...the moral of the story again, go to lunch bunch and do not attempt to take two young children to the grocery store by yourself to do long haul grocery shopping!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! (that is a shout out to you jonie--hope you made it this far to see it!!!)