How I lost my Rock Star Mom status this summer

I stated in this post early in the summer (in fact I think it was the first week of the summer) that one reason I hated summer was the fact that I had to take my boys to the store and run all errands with me. I hated it because of the inevitable delays it causes me and because of the constant trips to the bathroom it entails AND because of the incessant requests for a treat at the check-out line.

There was an additional aspect that I hadn’t considered which developed over the course of the summer.

Normally, on days I would go to the grocery store while the kids were at school simultaneously for the last couple of years, they would come home to a fridge and pantry full of unexpected treats – new items awaiting their immediate after-school consumption. Fruit snacks, raisins, peanuts, graham crackers, cereal, popcicles, etc. They were none the wiser that these items had a non-generic equivalent until I would bring home the Justice League graham crackers I had purchased that day only because they were equal to or less than the price of their generic equivalent. And I was “SAAA-WEEEET” for it in their eyes. I was a Rock Star if I brought home a Scooby Doo box of cereal and they had no idea, nor did they care, that I bought it simply because I had a coupon or it was sale-priced. No, Mom was simply the bomb for providing such an indulgence.

Now that they are with me, they are suddenly aware their favorite cereals, fruit snacks, popcicles, etc. all have a Spongebob, Scooby Doo, Spiderman, Disney, insert-character-of-choice-here equivalent. . My boys have always been suckers for gimmicks and for on-the-box advertising. And I am now a constant drag for suddenly squelching their eager little desires for the item if it isn’t on sale or cheaper for whatever reason. You know it is getting to the point of sinking in, though, when you are able to make a grocery run without the kids and you get home and hear them exclaim when discovering the Disney yogurt in the fridge, “Yes! Winnie the Pooh was on sale this week!!!”

I can only hope their short-term memories will be wiped clean soon with readin’, ‘ritin’ and ‘rithmitic so I can reclaim my Rock Star Mom status in their adoring eyes.

KEEP BELIEVING