Andrea’s Weblog

Shopping with a toddler is like shopping with a traveling circus -
you never know what to expect and you always attract a crowd. Last
weekend Elizabeth and I headed to Columbia, SC for a much-needed
clothes shopping expedition. It seems that my “mom” clothes (the ones
I buy on sale at Target so I don’t get upset when someone dumps
babyfood on me) are looking too frumpy to be seen in public. So, we
headed to a mall that had some nice stores.

I strapped Elizabeth into her umbrella stroller and hit store #1. As
soon as the stroller stopped, she demanded out. She wanted to play
with the seat belt buckles, latching them, asking me to unlatch them,
then latching them again. As I was paying, another shopper was
chatting with Elizabeth and Elizabeth decided to show the woman that
she can take her own shirt off now. I looked down as she was tugging
it over her head and the shopper was smiling at her and saying “ooh
you can take your shirt off!” I had to try and explain to her that
despite the fact that I had just taken my shirt off (in the fitting
room) that it was not acceptable for her to take off hers, despite
her smiling audience.

In an attempt to distract her from the buckles and shirt, we went to
Starbucks. The cashier handed her a huge Starbucks logo sticker,
which she proudly wore on her shirt. She sipped her hot cocoa as we
strolled along. Usually I feel that I get my money out of the $1
kiddie cocoas, but this day it took her all of 5 minutes to decide
she was done with it. I stopped in front of Ann Taylor Loft to take
it away from her. Somehow as she handed it to me it fell to the
ground, lid flying and cocoa spilling all over the floor. I had
several napkins which clearly weren’t going to cut it. I started to
push the stroller toward Ann Taylor, only to notice I was leaving a
trail of cocoa. I noticed a jewelry booth in the middle of the mall a
few yards away and pushed the stroller there to see if they could
call a janitor. I decided not to stand by the mess waiting for the
janitor to come. The embarrassment would be too great, plus, I was
still on Elizabeth time. The mess was big enough that people would
likely see it before stepping in it anyhow. So we went into Ann
Taylor to shop around, and I told them a janitor was on the way.
There must have been some confusion as to who was called or if the
janitor was coming, because I looked out and saw mall security and
another mall employee standing around the mess on walkie-talkies
having a not-so-quiet conversation about the situation. I wanted to
blend in with the innocent shoppers, but that was impossible since I
was pushing around a kid covered in cocoa and wearing a huge
Starbucks sticker. It definitely wouldn’t have taken a detective to
identify the guilty party.