Sunday, February 3, 2008

No, Later!

Have you ever been in a store with a kid who whines and begs for everything in sight? It's annoying, isn't it? We've turned it into a bit of a game here at Steingruebl World Enterprises. The way I see it, I practiced this well enough as a kid to be brilliant at it as an adult and there must be some way to use this "skill" to my advantage.

Enter "pre-emptive" begging. When I take Elise through a store, I ask her repeatedly, "Do we need one of those, how about one of those, are you sure why not one of those then?" She spends our entire trip through Target so busy telling me that we don't need blenders and socks that there is not time for her to get her "whine" on. It's a fun game for both of us, and makes the errands go faster besides.

Today, we had a quick errand to run and Elise brought Later. We had what we needed in hand, and all the way to the check-out Later kept saying, "Meow, do we need one of these?" and pointing to things on the shelf with her little paws. (Elise was helping with the pointing and doing the interpreting.) The whole time, we were both giggling and I was saying, "No, Later!"

I have to admit that when I'm playing with my kiddo and having a fabulous time I'm used to the world around me seeming to stand still. So, it didn't register at first as a family stood across the aisle with the kids staring open-mouthed and the parents looking befuddled. And of course when I did realize what they must be thinking I giggled all the more. A little later, I noticed a girl about Elise's age staring at us and looking aghast. It was fantastic.

Who knew that running errands with a kid who asks for everything in sight could be so much fun?

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

It just goes to show that, sometimes, parents are smarter than kids. I always just acted overbearing and said , "NO"!

Unknown said...

That's great, gotta remember that for when my daughter gets to that age.