"My You Have Your Hands Full!"

This video some of you may have seen, but it describes my trip to Sam's yesterday.

I wanted to crawl in a hole after the first few minutes of shopping. Normally I don't take all four boys, but yesterday I didn't have a choice and I spent a lot of time preparing myself so much that I almost purposefully missed the exit to Sams.

Part of the reason I almost chickened out is because I have a temporarily psycho 3 year old on meds for his croup. Since the meds are steroids he quite frequently turns into the incredible hulk out of the blue and I knew he would be an issue.

It only took two minutes after entering the store for My 3 year old to turn into the Hulk. In the bread isle, he proceeded to smack Elijah across the face while letting out a huge scream, "STOP IT!". With clinched teeth I whispered, "Jacob, don't ever do that again, you are going to get a spanking when we get to the car!". After my eldest realized I didn't see he was 'egging it on' he began sucking up for attention and started crying. So here I am in the bread isle scolding my psychotic three year old while my eight year old whines.

Shortly, I began convincing myself this would get better and about one minute later, my five year old, "spiderman", ran ahead of us. I found him trying to scale the freezer doors in the cold foods section.

Usually the boys do well in the store, but yesterday was different. I should have turned around and walked out when the shopping cart became a jungle jim about one second after entering the store.

You know, human nature is pretty interesting. While all of this was going on you would think there would be people there who would be more thoughtful to a mom who is dealing with a short term nightmare. Instead I had to endure the excruciating onslaught of the most dreaded phrase, "My you have your hands full". Not once, but about five times. Not to mention the classic, "Glad they aren't my kids".

Here is a little bit of education for the 'hands full' crowd. Most mom's go through a grueling mental process when deciding whether or not to take their children to the store, but sometimes the need outweighs the timing and they have to go. While we are shopping we are just trying to stay alive and not blow it by going off and screaming in front of everyone.

We walk up and down the isles brainwashing ourselves with the phrase, "O.k. This won't last long. This is just a short period of time in a day and when you compare that to a lifetime, it is no big deal". "Just suck it in and finish!".

In essence, we are trying to FORGET that we have our hands full.

So, the next time you see a mom with four boys causing havoc in a grocery store, why not say something like this: "My your children are beautiful, you are a blessed woman!" Now, that would make a mom's day.

By the way, if I hear the "hands full" greeting one more time, I may just say, "Yes I do, and I was thinking of giving two of them away, would you be interested?".