My three year old was a little exhausted (and very dirty) from playing on the playground. I tried to clean him up a little in the car with little success. We went into Target and my first goal was to use the bathroom. His first goal was to get the special cart. Okay, first battle lost. We got the special cart and headed to the bathroom. He insisted that he didn't need to go and he should stay in the cart... well, that monster cart is not fitting in the door so I had to drag him kicking and screaming so that I could at least use the bathroom. No luck with him though and back we went to the special cart.
Off to the tissues. I found the Puffs that were on special and I grabbed the two boxes and put them in the cart. Also using this as a counting experience to have my little guy double check the number of tissue boxes we were getting which helped me distract and get half way through the rest of the store.
He looked up and promptly requested that if this store had toys, he wanted to see the Thomas and Friends ones. I quickly distracted with Halloween costumes and we tried on masks for a little bit. Then, I saw the school clearance section!!! YEAH!! I grabbed a few different items and headed to the Thomas toy section (very close to the price checker at this store). I price checked a few of the notebooks and paper and found a neat 70 page notebook for $0.05! What a bargain?! Potty dance has begun because he wouldn't just do it while we were at the front of the store. Little man declares that it is time for the potty and off we go all the way to the farthest place we could possibly go in the biggest, hardest cart to navigate. Now he is starting to insist that he doesn't have to go anymore. We make it to the bathroom and I take off his pants but he is still insisting that he doesn't have to go. I bribe with Scooby Doo fruit snacks out of my bag which works and he stops fighting with me and goes to the bathroom. Crisis averted!! I distract with snacks but he finally decides that he wanted to eat his sandwich.
We are ready to check out but my son decides that he is finally on board with the plan to use the notebooks to put his stickers in and blue is not an acceptable color. We are headed to the very back of the store once again to get green- his favorite color. He decided, as you can see from the picture, that he also liked red and purple too!!
On the way to the front to check out, he sees the Goldfish on the end of the aisle and he wants to get the big box. He looks at all the boxes and picks out the one with the school bus on it. He likes the flavor blasted ones and won't even finish the color ones that he picked out last time. I tell him that we have yummy White cheddar Cheese-Its at home so we don't need any Goldfish. He seems okay and we head forward to check out.
First check out, 2 boxes of Puffs tissues. I used two coupons and got two bag credits. Total OOP $15.47, savings $9.40.
Second check out, my son tells the cashier that he would like to buy his three notebooks and trusts them on the belt. He picks out the green reusable bag to put them in. We check out with a total of $0.11 after bag credit using the $5 gift card that I earned through the Puffs promotion.
We pull through and I start putting everything away and getting the cart ready to go when my son declares that we forgot the Goldfish and we need to go back there and get them. REALLY?? I should have just put them in my cart and saved the extra trip but seeing my exhaustion, the manager at the front of the store says; "You can leave the cart and walk with him back there." In my head, ummm... If I did that then we would never get out of the store but I said thank you very much but he really loves this cart (still a true statement and he probably would have flipped out if I told him that we were leaving it there). I asked him if he was going to eat them because I didn't think that he liked them so he proved it by picking the one orange colored Goldfish out of the snack in his lunch bag.
Anyway, we are well into the napping hour and patience on both sides was fading fast. We go very quickly all the way back to the back of the store and he gets the school bus Goldfish (mind you that nothing is different inside the box.. it is just a picture on the outside of the box but I think that he must have them at school). We head back for our third check out. Our cashier was busy so we went to the next one over. She rang it up and talked to my son about her daughter having the same shirt as him except her's was Minnie and not Mickie. She bagged the Goldfish and I paid with my Target gift card still leftover and then an additional $2.22. She asked me if I already paid for everything else piled in the cart. I told her that we had just check out at register 9 and pointed. We were finally headed to the car and I was hoping on our way to naptime when my son decided that he was mistreated because we didn't go back to look at all the toys. I told him that we would come back again soon!! I didn't mention that Mommy didn't have the coupons that she needed to get his favorite pizza so we really would be back soon but we finally got in the car and were on our way. He fell asleep on the way home and we got tissues!! It was an exhausting trip but we got part of what we needed so it was the best that I could have hoped for :)
Total OOP $17.69
Total Savings $9.86
This was sadly the trip that put me over budget but I was planning on getting these next month anyway so going to buy one box at a higher price and stay under budget didn't seem like a good idea. I am sure that going over this month with a few last minute trips (one more to Harris Teeter and one more to Target) will give me tons of wiggle room for next month :) I hope that you get to check out the school clearance and see if there is anything that you can't live without like notebooks for coloring and stickers and writing. I am sure he will get tons of use out of them to justify the $0.11. The Goldfish, I am not so sure!!! Well, this is the cost that one pays for shopping with a three year old. Hope you find the story entertaining because I am sure there are many mothers that can relate and have had similar days :)
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