Summertime. No preschool. It's the time of year when I get to take three young children grocery shopping on a regular basis.
I'm pretty sure most moms would agree that grocery shopping with young children is rather stressful. Most of the time my kids behave just fine, but even then I'm stressed because I feel like it's a ticking time bomb. If we are in the store too long, something negative is bound to happen. So I race through the store, hoping I actually grab everything on my list, plus everything I forgot to put on my list, before trouble hits.
My summertime strategy when I have a large grocery trip with three kids in tow is bribery with junk food. (What? Don't your parenting books recommend that, too?) If all goes well, our last stop is the donut case to get three donuts. One for Caleb, one for Hayden, and one for Avery and me to share. I eat my 1/2 donut to celebrate my survival, not just my good behavior.
This week Caleb asked to carry the donut bag, rather than putting it in the cart. When we got to the checkout Caleb and I both forgot about putting the donut bag on the conveyor belt. We got home, I saw the bag in Caleb's hand and said, "Uh-oh, Caleb, did we pay for those?"
Poor Caleb was extremely distraught. I tried to reassure him that it's ok that we made a mistake, those things happen, etc. I said, "Next time we go to the store we can tell the cashier that we would like to pay for 3 donuts" and then I saw his face and quickly added, "Or we can go back to the store now and pay for them. What would you like to do?" He wanted to hop right back in the car and go pay ASAP.
I convinced Caleb to let me put away our groceries before returning to the store. In the mean time I gave Hayden and Avery their donuts to keep them occupied while I put away the food. Caleb was quite concerned about that so I assured him that the people at the grocery store don't care when you eat the food, they just care that you pay for the food you take. Not good enough for Caleb. He kept his donut in the bag, even though he was probably hungry seeing as it was snack time.
Next I loaded up the gang into the car and we headed right back to the store. Caleb was too ashamed to carry the bag, so he wanted me to hold it. We paid our $1.77 for the donuts and left. Then Caleb ate his donut in the car with a clean conscience. He was still disturbed by the whole incident and said he was upset with himself for forgetting to put the bag on the belt.
It was quite the morning! I was happy to see that Caleb was so committed to doing the right thing. But it was hard to see him beating himself up unnecessarily. Everybody makes mistakes, and in this case nobody got hurt and it was easy to make things right. And I'm sure it will be a loooooong time before we forget to pay for donuts again!
Sunday, July 18, 2010
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3 comments:
Seriously - at least they let you pay and didn't treat you like you were crazy. There have now been three occasions - 2 at Tim Horton's and one at Walmart where the people acted like we were crazy, and did not charge us/ take the money back. Walmart it was a case of diapers 2 years ago. Tim Hortons - twice in the last year they have given me change for a $20, when I gave them a $10. =P
Aww, what a sweetheart! What an encouragement that he wants to do the right thing, and what a good example you are to him even though it was a real hassle! That was a great life lesson about honesty :)
That is SUCH a cute story! Let's hope that conscience follows him all the way through adulthood - a real treasure!
I liked how he added, "Or we could go back to the store right now" and then to make it worse, "What would YOU like to do?" I know how difficult it is to take two kids just to get a few essentials... making sure they're clean and fed, packing them in the car, taking them in the store, doing what you have to do and then doing it all in reverse! That's quite a commitment. But I'm sure Caleb - more than anyone - appreciated your effort :) Way to go, mama!
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