Retail Rollercoaster

We've all done it.  We've ALL been THAT shopper who picks up something and then a few aisles over decides they don't want it, and rather than walking it back to where you found it, you just ditch it somewhere.... after covertly checking that no one is watching you.

We've all also been weaving through clothing racks and knocked something on the floor.  We've had our kids cry, we've had potty training accidents in public, we've gotten stuck in clothing in the fitting room and wondered if someone was going to have to come in and cut us out of this garment.  We've passed gas and blamed it on our kiddos, we've dropped a gallon of milk and had to ask an employee to help clean it up.  We've all had our child hide in a clothing rack and "disappear" for a heart-stopping moment.

But I never imagined that the poor people working in retail had to watch all those things happen multiple times each shift.

I also never imagined that during a slow spell one of the cashiers would go out into the aisle and "pop n lock" while waiting for another guest to come to the check stand.  {For those more 'weathered' readers, that is a style of dancing}.  But, that is for another post.  However, I have to say that I'm embarrassed FOR her every time I see her doing that.  She also pop n locks in the break room during her break.  Sometimes I accidentally go on break at the same time.  And it's a really LONG 15 minutes when that happens, with me trying really hard not to watch and to avoid eye contact at all costs because I'm sure my disdain for the situation would shine through in my gaze.

NOT my actual co-worker.  My co-worker is a girl, silly.

Don't get me started on how there is another employee who is a self-confessed connoisseur of 90s music.... and how I laughed when he said he was born in 1992.  He doesn't understand why I found that amusing.  Buddy, you did NOT grow up in the 90s.  You grew up in the 00s.  You were a child without fully formed opinions in the 90s.  You still ate an after school snack and watched PBS kids in the 90s.  But I digress.

ANYHOW, I didn't know that the retail business would be such an adventurous place to work.  There are so many things I just didn't know.  Like, really, I would probably just not try on clothing when you go shopping.  It's best to just be super sure of your size before you shop.  Honestly, taking the risk of having to make a return is better for your health than entering the twilight zone that is a fitting room.  If you most go in, do NOT use the big stall.  That is where all the weirdness goes down.  That is where moms go in with their toddlers who can't be left to wait outside the room.  And THAT, dearest reader, is where 99.9% of public potty training accidents happen.

That is also where teenage girl herds go to try on maternity clothing, or animal print feety pajamas, and take selfies of themselves in it, while giggling.  I really, really never imagined maternity clothing would be such a draw for the 14 year-old set.  Sometimes those same teenage girls ask a retail employee to take a selfie with them.... though the employee is just supposed to stay in their work clothing.  While there is no shame in agreeing to take the selfie, it's still kind of an awkward moment.  Who knows WHERE that selfie is going to show up later!!

NOT the actual teenage girls.  They would be wearing tiger stripped pjs

Friends, fellow shoppers, you only think you're being sneaky when you ditch items.  You aren't.  Shoving them under a pile of clothing doesn't make you as stealthy as you think you are.  Sending you toddler to ditch the item so that your conscience can remain clear is just downright shameful behavior.

Speaking of toddlers, for the LOVE people.... tell them the rules and then stick to it.  I can't believe how many toddlers sneak off and hide in the clothing racks {as previously mentioned, we've all been there so I'm not judging} only to have their mom stand there for 15 minutes trying to coax them out.  "Honey, if you want to go look at toys you have to come out of there"..... "If you don't come out we aren't looking at toys"...."Honey, if you please come out I'll take you to see the toy section"....."Buddy, I'm not letting you buy a toy if you don't come out".... on repeat for 15 minutes. Then, when their precious little sugarbug does finally come out, "Oh, what a good child you are.  You are just the best for obeying Mommy.  Let's go get you a toy!"

Pah-lease.  Huge eye roll!  One warning and then reach in there like a giant and pluck them out of their little hidey hole. You think you are looking so good in public by not disciplining your child forcefully, but you really look totally spineless.  Some days when it's about 10 minutes in and I can't take it anymore, I sneak up on the other side of the rack and peak in at the child.  I find that a stranger's face usually startles them out and they run to mommy.  Hey, I'm really being nice here because I've just helped out the Mom and scored the kid a toy for their "good" behavior.

Perhaps my favorite are the people who don't care that their child is crying.... and it's 10:45 p.m.  I'm 36 and I'm exhausted.  So is that child.  Go home.  There is nothing in Target that is more important than your child's needs.  Unless it's m&ms.... then by all means do carry on.  But make it quick.

Oh, and speaking of  late at night, when the lights in the store turn off because we've closed, that's a really inappropriate time to hurry to the fitting room and try some things on.  We want to go home.  Also, someone probably peed in there earlier and in the dark you won't be able to avoid the dark spot on the carpet.  Needless to say I won't warn you about it, because you kinda get what you get after 11 p.m.

Overall it's been an interesting ride.  Each day brings with it some surprises, some mundane moments, some embarrassment and some laughs.

I definitely will not be a lifer at good old Target.  I'm pretty sure I don't hate myself that much.  But while I'm there I'm gonna enjoy the ride!!

The Oldie

Well, friends, I'm old.  I've known it for a while now, but it hadn't really hit home until I started my new job as a Target employee.

Like I told my team lead the other night, "I sweat so much working here that if I don't lose at least 15 pounds I'm gonna be mad".

Sweat.  Where did that come from?  The 19 and 20 year-old girls I'm working with aren't sweating.  Their little red t-shirts aren't stuck to their backs.  They aren't constantly wiping rainfalls of water from their foreheads or under their eyes.  They don't seem to be crazy with the need for water.

And I'm slow.  I've been ruined by spending the last 10 years walking at the pace of a toddler.  Meandering.  Stopping to look at everything and anything of interest as we go along.  Now I can't keep up with the other girls as they whip at a frenzied pace from location to location, cheerfully jabbering in their walkie talkies as they go about shouting out acronyms at the speed of light.

When I yell, "Can we fix it?"  They just blink at me and smile.... that smile you give the elderly when they aren't making much sense but you don't want to point it out.  Guess Bob the Builder isn't part of their daily viewing.

On one of my first days of employment a girl asked me how old I am.  I was fine with answering 36.  My age doesn't bother me other than I realize time seems to be speeding up.  I've been through a lot, I've grown, I DESERVE to claim every one of those 36 years.  Turns out I'm - at a minimum - 10 years older than all the rest.  "You've aged well.  You look younger than that," she replied.  I just smiled... the same smile that the elderly give to the young who are trying to soothe over a hurt that wasn't actually inflicted.

I'm that plodding oxen on the wagon trail with a bunch of thoroughbreds.  They race about, flitting from task to task, chatting and laughing as they go about.  While they chat, flit, and giggle I fold, hang, sweat and work steadily.  Somehow I manage to make progress, even though they seem to be the ones running from task to task.  In the story of the Tortoise and the Hare I have become the Tortoise.

I've decided it's my "Mom-ness" that is the difference.  I'm used to picking up after people.  To going back to  a place I've already cleaned and having to clean it again.  I'm used to the multitasking of answering phones, sorting carts, helping guests and sweating.  Always with the sweat.

The young girls like to gather outside of work and watch movies like The Notebook.  I am that party pooper who just wants to go home.  It's 11:30, are you girls crazy?  I try to remember what it was like when I was 19 and my social group was the same as the group I worked with.  But now my social group is snuggled in their beds, smelling of baby soap and apple scented shampoo.  The one I want to see the most is warm from the covers and murmurs a bit as I crawl into bed, legs aching, finally with the sweat washed off my face.

It's an adjustment for all of us, me working outside the home for the first time in 10 years.  We're working out the kinks.  I'm so proud of my little wagon train as the children step up and Hubs guides things in a way that my strong temperament doesn't always make room for.  We are all growing....

Can't wait to see what this new path brings.

Dr. Doom

My mom and I were discussing her recent eye doctor appointment. {Right now I can't remember if an eye doctor is an ophthalmologist or an optometrist or whatever "op" it is, and I'm too stinking tired to Google it.  So, for the purposes of this blog it will simply be an eye doctor.}

Anyhow, after she told me her tale we were laughing so hard at how sometimes doctors are just harbingers of joy.  It was so delightful, that halfway through the appointment she told him she was going to start calling him Dr. Doom :)

In the spirit of sharing things we can all relate to with a giggle, I asked her if I could blog some of the highlights of her eye adventure.  She agreed.  So, please, enjoy the lovely snippets of an eye doctor appointment.

My dad went with my mom, probably to act as an emotional support.  Apparently when the doctor went to do the eye test he handed my mom that little spoon shaped thing that you cover an eye with.  He then instructed her to cover her left eye.... which she did.... using her left hand.  The tool sat useless in her other hand.  Ha ha.  She quickly realized her mistake and started laughing.  The doctor looked at my dad and Dad said, straight faced I'm sure, "You'll have to be VERY specific with her!"  I believe from that point forward the doctor took that advice to the extreme.

Mom asked about some droopiness she'd noticed in her left eye lid.  The doctor's reply, "Yes.  That happens when you wear hard contacts for many years."  Oh.... information that may have been helpful 40 years ago.  Then he threw in this little gem, "That will happen to the other eye too.  But don't worry, when you get cataracts and have to have surgery we'll correct the drooping at the same time!"  Oooh.... phew!  Good news indeed!

She, of course, asked about trading to a different type of contact in order to perhaps ward off some of the drooping and he said something about how at this point it would just be extra work to go that route.  She's been wearing the same contacts for years, no reason to go to the effort of changing now.  {Apparently when you're 60 it's all downhill and we wouldn't want to put in any extra effort when cataracts are on their way anyhow!}

Not her actual doctor

Next, during that eye exam where the doctor pretty much sticks his nose on your nose and looks into your soul he said, "Oh, you have a little "v" shape in your eye.  I better make a note of that so that when you get dementia we can remember when that "v" showed up."   Uh..... okay.  You're the doctor!

He also noted a small mole in my mom's eye.  "I'm surprised you don't have melanoma," he said casually.  "Those kinds of moles can kill people.  We'll make a note of that too so that we can refer back to it when it becomes a problem."  Nice bedside manner, this guy!

All in all it was a very uplifting experience.  She was given a clean bill of health - albeit clearly he believed that to be a temporary thing - and sent on her way.

She was able to laugh about it, rather than cry.... because crying would make her eyes swell, which could bring on the cataracts and dementia, not to mention inflame the mole causing fatal melanoma!

You can never be too careful!

Summer

I think we all know the cliche of summer.  At the start of summer parents {and kiddos} everywhere are SO DONE with homework, the early morning rush, packing lunches, doing hair, and asking 50 times each morning if everyone has on clean undies.

At the end of summer parents everywhere {not so much the kiddos} are SO DONE with never ending messes, hours of electronics, begging people to do their chores and knowing that no one is wearing clean undies.

Right now, we're over the middle line and on our countdown back to school.  I have mixed feelings.  As summers go, this has been one of my best with my little family.  I attribute it to the fact that the children are getting older.  Some of them have even {GASP} begun sleeping until 8:00 a.m.  Heaven to this mama!!

But there are definitely days when I want to go back to the days of clean-er and quiet-er.  This coming school year will see my oldest three in school all day. It will just be me and JB home together.  It's going to either be paradise, or be like boogers in the oatmeal.  Only time will tell.

Today it has rained all day.  I love summer rainstorms.  I don't love the fact that it turns into Giggle-Fest 2014 when the kids and their accomplices friends are forced to be inside all day.  They are giddy because I gave them the green light on electronics IF they agreed to keep themselves in the basement all afternoon.

So I'm sitting here thinking about our summer, and how I'm going to be starting a job this weekend, and how even though sometimes the kids are like pesky dust bunnies on your furniture, I'm going to miss them when the routine comes back.

In the spirit of celebrating summer, here is a snapshot of what that's been like at our house.

 Yep.  Looks like our summer has been pretty great!!!

Disclaimer:  I have the right to totally and completely change my mind in the next couple of weeks!!!

Future Gymnasts

Well, looks like we've checked another future career off the list at our house.

Gymnast has gone out in a blaze of rope burns and fetal positions.

Today Ms. Els and Cadie Lu had their first class at the local gymnastic school.  Somehow in their brains I believe they have switched up the word "gymnastic" with "spastic" and just think the more they spaz out, the more successful their efforts have been.

When I picked them up - after getting the boys' hair cut and stopping for a drink - they were all smiles and happily reported that they'd had a great time.

"Although,"Cadie Lu began, "I think we've figured out something our family is just not good at."  I won't pretend that I was surprised when she stated that rope climbing didn't seem to be something her and her sister would excel at. "All the other kids would get up to the top, but Els and I would get up like five inches and then just give up."

Yep, sounds about right.

See, even when I was their age, and their size, I've never been able to haul my keister up a rope.  I neither saw then, nor see now, the point.  I've always gone with brains over brawn and been sure to surround myself by men with some muscle. I've been happy to let them scramble up the side of a cliff and then turn to pull me up.  In fact, one time I ended up hanging off the side of a ledge holding on to Hubs's big toe.... ha ha ha... but, that's for another post.

"One time, in gym class, I ended up stuck on the rope climb."  Els piped in.  I asked for a little more info.  "Oh, man, I was SO embarrassed...." she said.  All good stories in my family start with that line.  I'm happy to see her coming into her gene pool so gracefully.  "I got up and then I got scared because a ball accidentally got kicked into me and the rope was swinging around.  Then my hands got all sweaty and it was like they stuck to the rope.  So I was just hanging there, stuck, for a while.  Finally I started screaming and the whole class got quiet and was staring at me.  And then my teacher came in to get us and she yelled and came over to help me down.  Not the PE teacher, my class teacher."

Awesome.  Welcome to the fold Els.  Get comfy here.

"Ya, and one of the teachers today had to help Els get over a bar, " Cadie added.  I gave Els the old one eyebrow lift that says, 'do continue'....

"Well, my legs are really long, but apparently their natural inclination is to ball up close to my chest like this."  She demonstrates by rolling into fetal position in the car.

Before we finish that, I'd like to point out that it's pretty much Sweet Moses that my 10 year old said the phrase, 'apparently their natural inclination'.  I've never been so proud.

"So," she continued, "I kept yelling at my legs, 'straighten out legs, straighten out', but they didn't want to.  So the teacher would come straighten them out for me to get over the bar."

Uh.... nice.  Ha ha.  I am willing to bet that my almost 5 foot tall, size 7 (woman's) shoe wearing, "baby" was about the same size as her teacher.  And she was stuck in fetal position.  Let's also grin for a moment about her shouting at her legs....nothing strange about that!

All in all, a success.  No one tried to catch a bar with their face or ran backwards into a pole.  Although I should share that as I was pulling up to the building they insisted that they are now old enough to go in alone - even on the first day - and would find where they needed to be.  Apparently that involved them standing in a corner crying when it didn't go as planned until Els wiped her tears and said, "This is DUMB!  I'm going to find some help" and she found an employee who guided them to the right place.

Do I feel guilty that my babies were crying in a corner?  Heck yes.

Am I proud that after a moment of weakness that girl got down to business and fixed things?  Double yes.

Now, if only she could use that same stubbornness to get those legs of hers to straighten out....

My Gift to Me

Some of you are probably familiar with my tradition - starting on my 30th birthday - of giving myself a birthday gift each year.

It isn't anything tangible, more something that I give myself "freedom" from that helps make my life more enjoyable.

It started when I was about to turn 30 and I read somewhere that the 30s is your decade of self discovery.  I laughed, because I foolishly thought that at 29 I had myself all figured out, but decided that in an effort to kick off my 30s I would come up with things that I wanted to change.

Some of my gifts over the past years have been:

Freedom from "downer" friendships
Freedom from camping with little children
Freedom from singing solos
Freedom from crafts - ick!

All these things have made my life more enjoyable and helped me realize that, indeed, I am free to choose the things that will make ME happy and not try to fulfill a list given to me by the outside world, or even given to me by preconceived notions of how I thought my life would go.  It's been lovely.  I always encourage my friends to do this and it's kind of a joke now.... what do we want to be free of in the future.

Well, this year I shocked even myself with the direction my gift took our family.... in fact, I didn't see it coming until about two weeks before my birthday.

This year I'm giving myself the gift of freedom from debt.

I'm the money handler in our house and so I get the pleasant task of working the finances.  It's such a bummer job. Anyhow, I started looking over student loans, surprises that have come up {all new HVAC} etc. and realized that if I just keep trucking along doing minimum payments we won't be done paying off all our debt (obviously some things aren't included in that) for about 6 more years.  Eliana would be going on 17 and Jasec 8.

Say WHAT??!!

Then I began thinking back on my childhood - all those family trips taken as a teenager that cemented my bond with my family.  Braces, my first car, dances, music, sports....And I realized that I'd miss out on all that as a mom if we remained in the trenches of debt payments.

It really hit me that we are coming up to some pretty crucial years in the lives of our children.  Years where we want to be "free" to go and do and see and experience before we send them off to create families of their own.

So, after much pondering on my role as a mom, and crossing illegal options off the list, I went out and got me a job.  I will now be the newest employee at....

Drum Roll....

Target in Centerville.  (It was that or McDonalds - I think you see that my choice was made for me!)

I'll be working part time nights and weekends doing sales floor stuff and some cashiering starting the first week of August.

So, if you're out shopping and you see me, come say hi.....

And don't forget to wish me "happy birthday" and "good luck" with this year's gift :)

{Also, wish Steve luck as he'll be taking on Daddy duties those nights and weekends!  It seems I may have given myself TWO gifts this year.....}