One thing we didn't really anticipate with 3 kids was how on earth you take them all shopping with you! Granted, my husband is currently 'between opportunities,' as he likes to call it,(In other words, 'unemployed') so we do currently have two adults home. But even with the two of us, we haven't yet figured this one out! Its probably because we are not sleeping so well. So you get a cart. Check. Then apply the baby, who is conveniently tucked into his 'babypod'(as we have affectionately dubbed the carseat), to the top portion of the cart. Check. That's the easy part. What do you do with the 21-month old and the 4-year old? You try putting the little one in the bottom part of the cart. This would work if the 21 month old didn't start immediately screaming at the top of her lungs, causing everyone within earshot to stare at you like you were terrible people! But even if the screaming didn't happen, you would still have a problem, because the child would take up all the space you needed for the large amounts of stuff you had to buy at the store in order to care for your many children! So you let the little girl out of the cart. And she dances about in the isles with her older sister, as other shoppers do their best not to run the cute kids down! Meanwhile, you try to simultaneously shop, and keep the children out of harms way. It is very, very stressful.
As a rule we generally avoid Walmart, due to past experience, the way their products often self-destruct due to their cheap construction, and mostly, due to my social justice friend who has educated me about their sheisty business dealings. But sometimes, we have to go there in order to return a gift that has been purchased for us, because its just not working out. This time, we had a box of size 1 diapers, and our baby boy had busted out of size 1 diapers during the first week of his life! We totally needed size 2. We thought we could handle this, because we knew exactly what we were going for, which means we wouldn't have to wander around the store looking for something we needed or wanted to use the store credit on, which has led to some past bad experiences.
And we were proud of ourselves for having come up with a genius child-transportation plan! We have a sit-and-stand stroller. The box clearly states that the product is only approved for two children, but we have discovered that there is plenty of room for two girls to ride in the 'and stand' part of the stroller, while the baby rides cozily in the carseat up front. So we thought, as long as both parents are on the shopping adventure, why can't one parent push the three children on the sit-and-stand, while the other parent mans the shopping cart? Brilliant! However, this did not save us from another bad experience at my unfavorite store.
We arrived at the customer service center, where we had to wait in line for a long long time, along with unhappy holiday shoppers. When it was finally our turn, and I explained the diaper situation to the disgruntled employee at the desk. She did not say a word to me, but looked over at a co-worker beside her and said 'We can't exchange this, can we?' The co-worker explained that yes, unfortunately, because the box had been unopened(they checked the tape on both sides to make sure!) it can be exchanged, as long as its an 'even' exchange, even though I did not produce the desired receipt. She told us to go get the size we wanted and then yelled after us 'you have to come back here to the service desk!' In case I was going to attempt a diaper escape mission?
The store had been re-arranged since our last visit, which was several years ago, now. We spent a good deal of time trying to find the baby department, which we finally located in the remote back corner of the store. I grabbed the 2's and we sped along back to the service desk and disgruntled employees. I noticed as I put the diapers up on the counter that the box I had chosen had 100 diapers in it, and the box I was returning only had 92. This is a problem, because as you go up in sizes in the diaper world, the count generally goes down. Because clearly, the bigger the bottom of the child, the less diapers the child uses, right? Not so much, but this is just the way they sell diapers. So I was not surprised when I was asked to cough up $5 and some change. This is around the time that baby Toren woke up and started crying. I didn't have my wallet on me, but luckily, my husband came to my rescue and paid for the diapers, while I took over rocking the stroller back and forth for the baby. I knew he was hungry, so I thought it would be best if we went to the food court area, so I could nurse. As I was doing so, baby Toren decided to yet again prove that he indeed needed the next size up in diapers, and had a huge blowout! Not only were his clothes soiled, but mine were, too. When he was finished nursing, I trotted over to the restrooms, only to note that they were blocked off by the man cleaning them! Who cleans the restrooms at 5:30pm in a busy department store? Anyways, the cleaning man mumbled something in broken English, and I realize he's telling me to go use the bathroom in the back of the store! Lets see, drag the obviously poop-covered newborn through the entire store to use a different bathroom? If I wasn't still sore from my recent labor and delivery, I may have considered it. But it just wasn't happening. Maybe the men's room had a changing table? I headed back to where husband and the girls were camping out, in order to trade the baby off on the only one in the family that was allowed in the men's room, only to discover that he was on the phone. Having a very important conversation about a potential job interview! Yay, job interview, Boo bad timing. I attempted to keep the girls quiet, so he could talk on the phone, while I burped baby Toren, and tried not to get poopy in the process, until he was off the phone. At the point, I looked over at the bathrooms, and noticed that the cleaning guy was letting people use the bathroom! Apparently, everybody but me! I headed back to the bathroom, and he allowed me in. Diaper and outfit were changed, and we booked it out of Walmart as fast as we could push that sit-and-stand.
We have learned our lesson. Next time, we will just re-gift the too-small diapers to someone who has a tiny baby.
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