I’m kind of surprised we got quite a bit of shopping done today without having to find a sitter for the baby. We’ve been kind of afraid of taking her out and about with us. Part of it is because we’re still trying to protect her from the germs that are out there. We know she needs to be exposed to some germs to build her immune system, but with H1N1 all around us it’s best to keep her away from huge crowds.
The other part of it is I think we’re still afraid of taking her out in public and having her scream the whole time. Maybe it’s that we don’t want people to look at us and think we’re bad parents? There are so many people out there who automatically assume the worst and give you those dirty looks when your child cries out. Those are the people that make you feel like absolute dirt for disturbing them in public. Those are the people I’d like to kick in the teeth.well them and the people who park in the handicapped spots without a tag or a sticker (saw one today outside Big Lots).
We got over our fears, and we took her out shopping with us for most of the day. We started with a trip to the antiques store in town where Santa was visiting. After having her scream the whole time last week we wanted to try again hoping we’d get good photos this time. I didn’t want her baby’s first Christmas photo to be a big screaming face.
Boy am I glad we tried again, too, because this time Santa actually looks like Santa. Last week’s Santa was so scary looking I would have screamed, too, and his suit was definitely a cheap crappy one. This week’s Santa was as close to the real deal as you can get, and my little angel was sound asleep which made for a good photo.
After getting the Santa pic we headed out to finally do some Christmas shopping. We started at Tractor Supply where we got her a Christmas stocking so big we could fit 10 babies in it. Then we headed to Walmart for a couple items we needed before doing most of our Shopping at Big Lots. We finished the day at Family Dollar before heading back home with at least half our shopping list done.
I think I knocked out gifts for both my parents, Hubby’s Mom, and Hubby’s sisters. Now I just need to find something for my sis and her new Hubby, my stepmom, my step brother (it’s weird saying that now that my dad eloped), Joe, and my grandparents. I know what I’m getting Hubby’s dad, but I need to get it ordered this week. Everyone else is getting handmade goodies since I just can’t afford to go all out on presents this year. At least it looks like I may actually have my shopping done before Christmas Eve. If that happens it’ll be the first time in many years I haven’t spent Christmas Eve trying to pick up last minute presents in CVS before they close!
Brrr it’s cold out there! I didn’t want to have to go out in the cold tonight, but I had no choice. Sometimes you just need to go to the grocery store for the essentials. After sitting in front of the wood stove snuggled up with the baby all day it was hard dragging myself out into that cold air, but since I already had to go out we decided to go pickup dinner, too.
I had my mom come over to stay with Elliana so we didn’t have to take her out in the cold, and I’m glad I did. I can’t imagine taking her out on a night like this. Plus I’m still trying to keep her away from the germs in big places like the grocery store and stuff.
After hitting up the grocery store and CVS I feel like we looked at everything under the sun except kitchen faucets. I hadn’t exactly planned on going to CVS tonight either, but I needed to pick up a can of formula for the little one. We decided to switch the formula we’re supplementing with from Similac to Nestle Good Start, so I thought I’d grab a can at the grocery store tonight. I thought wrong!
Either Ingles doesn’t sell any powdered formula or it was covered with an invisibility shield. I looked all over that freakin’ store, and all I could find was the liquid premixed stuff on the small little baby isle. On top of that the only liquid Nestle Good Start was the soy kind. I seriously couldn’t believe the grocery store of all places didn’t have formula! I ended up having to pay outrageous prices to get it at CVS. I guess I’ll have to break down and pick some up at Walmart since it’s $5 cheaper there.
Now I’m just glad we’re in for the night where it’s nice and warm again. The baby is asleep in her bouncy seat, and I’m about to curl up on the couch where it’s nice and cozy with Hubby while we watch Notorious.
I will never again say that I’ve got all the time in the world. The arrival of Elliana has proven to me just how little time I really have to do the everyday things I need to get done. Throw in all that other stuff I would like to do, and I can almost bet most of it will never happen.
Take this weekend for instance. We fully planned to finish up some of that remodeling we had planned to accomplish before the baby arrived, and we were going to clean house. You’d think with 2 people we’d be able to get most of it done, but I don’t really think we accomplished anything. We were both too busy spending as much time as we could with our baby girl.
Then there’s that trip to Hubby’s parent’s house that we took. We learned just how hard it is to get dressed and on the road with a 3 week old in tow. On the way home we stopped at the Dollar General, and that’s when we realized how hard it is to take a baby shopping. Those small buggies do not hold a car seat, so Hubby had to carry her around the store while I did the shopping. I definitely won’t be taking her to that store on my own until she’s big enough to sit in the buggy.
We had planned to visit our friends and their new baby on Sunday, but after Saturday’s events we decided it was best to just stay home. We can get the babies together at a later date.
If everyday tasks like running into the store to grab a couple things are so challenging to us right now then I definitely don’t think we’ll be taking the trip we were considering for Christmas. We wanted to go see some family we have in Florida, particularly destin fl, but I don’t see that happening. In fact I think all vacations are on hold until next year.
Our frends and family will just have to settle for either making a trip up here or seeing her through photos and the birth announcements I’m about to order. Yep, I’m slack, and I’m just now getting the announcements ordered, but I’m using the excuse that I wasn’t prepared for all of this to happen just yet! I should have another 2 weeks before she arrives, but you know I wouldn’t change it for the world.
I think it’s about time I start rethinking which grocery store I’m shopping at again. We almost always shop at Ingles because it’s the only grocery store in our town. We could drive out of our way to do our shopping at Walmart (bleh), Bloom, or Bi-lo in another town, but Ingles most of the time has the cheapest prices anyway.
I’m about ready to make it a point to drive out of my way to Bloom or Bi-lo and pay the higher prices because I’m getting sick of Ingles. I’ve already complained twice about finding too many items sitting on the shelves that are out of date, and I think I’m going to have to do it again. I’ve gotten to a point where I try to remember to triple check sell by dates on most of the dairy because if it’s not already out of date it’s going to go bad in just a couple days. I even joked to Hubby that maybe I need to get on the ball checking out life insurance rates because I think Ingles is trying to kill me with a food born illness!
Last week I returned 4 containers of Laura Lynn single serve yogurt and 1 container of Laura Lynn sour cream because I got home and found them expired. The sour cream had been expired for more than a week! Most of the time I don’t have to worry about sour cream expiring for a month. At first I thought maybe it was just the Laura Lynn products that were expiring but that’s not the case. Yesterday I had to search through half a shelf of Philadelphia cream cheese before I found two packages that weren’t expiring before September 29. If I were going to use the cream cheese immediately it wouldn’t be an issue, but I know I won’t be using them until later in the week.
While I was looking for cream cheese Hubby picked up the plain yogurt that we add to Bubba’s food. I used to buy the single serve packages because we only use 2 Tbsp a day, but Ingles no longer carries plain yogurt in single serving cups. Now I have to buy it in the 32oz size. It’ll last us a lot longer, but with the sell by dates expiring on everything I’m almost afraid to buy it at all. Sure enough when I went to mix his food I discovered the sell by date is October 2. There’s no way we’ll use even half of it by then!
It’s bad enough we’re paying out the ass for groceries in this economy, but I’d at least like the products I buy to last more than a few days. We didn’t have this problem until recently, so it makes me wonder if people are buying diary items less causing them to sit on the shelf longer or if Ingles isn’t rotating the stock like they should be. It’s like the milk guy used to stock it from the back of the cooler where the newer stuff went behind the stuff that needed to sell first. Now you always see him out in front of the cooler slamming jugs on the shelf without paying attention.
I understand it’s perfectly ok to sell something up until that date printed on the packaging, but you’d hope a store would be paying attention to these things. I guess not, and that’s why I’m finding so many that are still sitting there well past the expiration date.
