Brilliant

At least, that's how I was feeling this morning. Grocery shopping with 4 kids can be a crazy, trying, annoying, frustrating, difficult, loud, embarrassing, draining (you get the picture) experience. With only one contained child, the rest feel they are on an adventure. An adventure to torture Mommy. They seem to instinctively know that they can get away with a lot more in public than at home, and they do it! The stores are giant play places. One can run around, screaming, moving food around, removing price labels, and opening all the freezer doors. I've even had to drag at least one child out of the employees only sections.

The past 9 months I've been shopping with only 2 (occasionally 3) children in tow. Much easier, trust me. School is out and I am back to shopping with all four kids. I spent the past couple of weeks racking my brain for ideas to entertain my children quietly. Then it hit me, letters. My middle two children are busy learning their letters. They hate to sit down and look at flash cards, so I have to be creative with education (something very hard for me!). I decided to have my children look for letters as we wandered the stores.

Before we headed out this morning I printed out 6 letter boards, one for each store. My oldest can read, but she likes to play games and would have felt left out if I did not print her a board. (I can only handle 2 stores at a time with all four of them.) I told them we would be playing a seek and find game at the stores. Excitement abounded. They could not wait to get to the store.

At the first store I handed them each a board and a writing utensil. I explained that they were to look for the letters on their boards. If they had capitals, they needed to find capital letters, and vice-versa. They spent the time searching diligently for letters while I shopped. They only ran out of letters while I was checking out at the last store, and then chaos began. But I had made it through 2 stores without dirty looks, noisy children, or frustration! Brilliant...



...Then I arrived home and realized I had forgotten to purchase vegetables, yet again. Looks like another run to the grocery store.

The Quiet Game

My children have learned to love to play games, almost any kind, from my husband. About a year ago I was driving in the car with the kids. The Dude and The Big Sister were arguing and being very loud. I suggested a game called "Let's see who can be quiet until we get to..." No prize, just whoever stays the quietest the longest wins. They loved it. Both will often suggest playing it when we drive, no matter the length of the trip. It's a great game for Mommy. I'm not sure how long this "game" will last for them. For now, I enjoy the quiet.