Grocery store lessons

It is absolutely amazing what trips to the grocery store can teach me!  I have to admit that I was pretty terrified of our first grocery store shopping trip with just me and the kids.  Public humiliation because of kids having temper tantrums, or me looking completely inadequate were my biggest fears, but I knew this was something I just had to figure out and get done.  I seriously had the conversation with Reed before bed discussing the logistics of how I will get the groceries and 3 nonwalkers (what we refers to our children as many times.  Yes 2 of them can walk, but not productively.  It would takes years to get the shopping done if they walked).  I knew I would either have to have 2 carts, the children cart and the grocery cart...or attach Abilene in her Moby and arrange the groceries around Max and Jerry just as I have done before.  Reed immediately ruled out the 2 cart situations because in his words, "You are a terrible driver!  There is no way you can handle 2 carts."  So we decided that the second option was the way to go.  He wished me good luck and said, "better you than me," and peacefully fell asleep.  Meanwhile, I stayed up a bit longer in fear of what this shopping trip might hold.

If it seems strange to you to be in this much fear about grocery shopping then you clearly do not have children like mine.  Jerry thinks that almost the whole store is a buffet and wants to open EVERYTHING before we even get home.  Max is great about sneaking secret items into the cart. Before I know it I have somewhere between 5-15 extra items that I don't even need (the funniest time was when we ended up with 7 jars of olives...gross!)  They are both getting to the age to where tantrums are not as frequent but they are also getting very active imaginations.  I often think they view the cart as a cage for their ultimate fighting championships.  They wrestle a lot at home, but for some reason the wrestling is taken to a whole new level once they enter their arena of the shopping cart. As a mom it is my job to raise "normal", healthy, and happy humans and I hate for it to appear as if I am not doing my job because my kids tend to act like kids!

The first time I went to the grocery store it was semi-productive with only one minor disaster of Jerry placing my phone in the fruit section of the grocery store. I can remember telling him to please hold my phone and then one things leads to the other and we get to Jerry's favorite part of the grocery store, or as I call it Jerry's buffet, and before I know it he is trying to sample grapes, apples and even lemons.  Somewhere in this my phone is sat down in one of the fruit bins.   Thankfully someone was kind enough to turn my phone in and it wasn't lost forever like I thought it would be.

It was semi weird putting the moby wrap on in the parking lot before we walked into the grocery store...which lead me to the first lesson in going to the store with 3 children.

1.)  Put the wrap on at HOME!  It is cleaner there (usually), so when the wrap inevitably drags the ground at least it is in the house and not in the parking lot.  Plus you don't get any strange looks from judgmentally weird people who seem to think that mother and children should be neither seen nor heard in public places.  It is kinda weird driving to town with the wrap on and no baby inside it, but far more worth it!
  ** Side note- I can't wait to use the Ergo, but she is more comfy in the Moby right now, so that is what we use. Hopefully in a month she will like the Ergo better**

There are several things that you do not need in a grocery store that for some reason I used to carry along:

2.)  There is absolutely no reason to carry in the whole diaper bag. As long as each child has their pacifier that is all we need.  I have no idea why I am just now figuring this out.  Did I seriously think if one of my children needed a diaper change I would change their diaper in aisle 3?!  Of course we would just go to the car.  No reason for that huge bag.

3.)  No wallet..No problem.  That is what pockets are made for!  All I need is my debit card and it fits perfectly in my pocket.  Why risk loosing my entire financial world (my wallet) in the grocery store when I am just needing a tiny card to complete the whole trip?

4.)  You DO NOT need your phone!  I doubt any major emergency is going to occur in the 30-45 minutes I am in the grocery store.  Mainly because most emergencies that would concern me are in my cart and attached to my body.  If someone (my husband) forgets to put something on the list or needs to tell me something to get last minute he is pretty much SOL and going to the store later to get whatever slipped his mind.  It took Jerry loosing my phone for me to realize that I didn't need it anyways.

I have only been to the store 4 times with all 3, so I am very sure I will learn a lot more.  Any helpful advice out there I would love to hear.

Crazy...I don't think so!

 I have always wanted my children close together and so has Reed.  He was an only child, so he always wanted his children to have a really close bond.  We decided to have another baby pretty quick so Max would have sibling really close to him.  Everyone thought I was crazy and that I wasn't going to go through with it. I wanted to loose all the baby weight before I got pregnant again.  I didn't just want to add to an amount that would be impossible to get off.  I am proud to say I lost 65 pounds in 7 months!  I vowed to never gain that much weight during pregnancy again.  Determined to have my babies close together we decided to just see what happens and see if I was one of the lucky women that are able to get pregnant while still breastfeeding.

 Well we did!  We happily announced our pregnancy before Max was even walking!  Max was just starting to not be a boob man anymore.  Yeah people freaked out a little.  "How are you going to be able to handle this?" "What were you thinking?"  "Not busy enough already?"  We knew we could do it and that is what we wanted.  We just had to pray that this pregnancy would be easier than Max's.  What are the chances at just really sucking at being pregnant?  Pretty good it turns out!

This was the day of Max's 1st birthday!  I was already pretty pregnant!

The first few months of my pregnancy were great.  Only all day sickness, but I was used to that.  I mean it wasn't that long ago that I was pregnant with Max!  Reed was just now getting used to not seeing me as a massive fat woman, but this time the pregnant belly came out faster than before.  I was in the maternity pants in 2 months!  Luckily at this time it was just the belly so it was kinda cute, but inappropriately big for being this early on.  Max thought the belly was a great pillow and race track for his cars.  Running after a toddler all day also was great at keeping the weight off!  My belly got huge, but luckily my legs stayed small.  Then the weight started showing up everywhere!  I had no idea why.  Was it preeclampsia again at just 27 weeks?!  Emergency appointment with my doctor and he says no preeclampsia, you just suck at being pregnant, it's like your body is rebelling.  Great...just what I wanted to hear.  I knew I would be having a c-section this time because I had one last time, so I was at least glad I didn't have to play the waiting for labor game.

30 weeks into the pregnancy I developed bleeding ulcers in my stomach and extreme heartburn that made my throat constantly bleed.  Ice cream was the only thing that really soothed any of it...so here comes more pounds!  I didn't gain 65 pounds this time, just 60!  UGH!   The ulcers and heartburn lasted the whole pregnancy, but at least I could deal with those at home!  2 scares of prelabor and my doctor moved the date up to May 24th for my csection.
It was so easy.  Walked into the hospital, checked in, walked to the emergency room, and 10 minutes later Jerry was here!  Amazing!  I got to hold him while they were still sewing me up and then after I was done he was in the room working on breastfeeding just 20 minutes later!  Such a different experience.  It was peaceful, relaxing, and our whole family got to be there to enjoy his first few newborn days at the hospital.  Max loved his new brother and tried to hold him all the time.

Discharged me from the hospital in 4 days and I was so happy to be leaving...little did I know I would be back.  Turns out my body reacted bad to my spinal.  I now had spine fluid leaking into my brain or something.  On a scale of 1-10 the pain was 100!!!  I never felt this much pain in my life.  I got to the point I wasn't even thinking clearly and was hallucinating.  Doctors told me to wait it out 2 days and it usually clears up on its own...it didn't!  Finally went back to the hospital, had a blood patch, and I was back to normal again...except for the nagging pain in my back from have a needle stuck in it twice in less than a week.

2 weeks of amazing perfect baby bliss at home.  Jerry was the best eater!  Max was the best brother.  It was all so easy I had no idea what these people who were scared were talking about.  I go back to my doctor for my 2 week checkup and he gives me that bad news.  No more babies for you.  Your body just hates it too much and I don't know if you or the next baby would make it though another pregnancy.  Dreams=crushed!

2 perfectly healthy babies and I was upset?!  Whats wrong with me?  Yeah I just want lots of children, 3 or 4.  Don't get me wrong I loved every minute of Jerry's newborn days, but I was sad I thought it would be my last one, so I cherished every single moment.  Then we started thinking adoption and it was the answer to our prayers!