Red Balloon

This morning I had 4 places I wanted to hit for errands. But I knew that my daughter had a 3-errand rule, so I scratched one errand off the list immediately. From the time she was born, Morgan has tolerated the first errand, squirmed terribly for the second errand and, if I'm lucky enough to GET to the third errand, she is screaming or fighting back dramatic pangs of death.

Today was no exception.

The first errand went relatively smoothly. The second errand was Home Depot.

For the most part, the Home Depot errand was not terrible... just the beginning and the end and a little in between. For starters, we got a cart that Morgan INSISTED we get- the last one with the two extra seats in front. Naturally it was the one with a wheel that jiggled so loudly I could hardly hear myself think. I bailed on the cart in aisle 11 and continued the errand in walk mode with daughter in tow. (Mistake #1: Letting daughter walk.)

To help Morgan get through the store with more entertainment, I asked an employee for one of the many balloons he was blowing up. He easily obliged. My daughter was happy with her red balloon. (Mistake #2: Giving child toy which is easily lost.)

Through the remaining time at the H.D., Miss Morgan was regularly falling from chasing the red balloon. Additionally, gusts of wind would catch the balloon and send it soaring to another aisle. Enter crazy, non-cart, merchandise-bearing mother running frantically from aisle to aisle to appease daughter.

But wait, I get stupider.

I had one last item on my list. I needed Potting Soil. The only bag available was the 40 million pound variety. There was no cart in sight except for halfway across the store. I summoned the Errand Muses and put the great heft upon my already full arms. (Mistake #3: Mother has no arms left.)

As I approached the checkout counter of the garden section of Home Depot, a whimsical gust of wind caught my daughter's balloon, sending it straight into the street. Without thinking, Morgan dashed after said balloon. Meanwhile, forgetting that the items in my arms were NOT glued to me, I ran after her with all the merchandise. The alarms went off (naturally) but I was able to grow a third arm in microseconds and grab my daughter from running into traffic. The balloon was instantly gone.

What happened next was inevitable. Morgan wailed miserably for that red balloon, crying dramatically, "My red balloon is gone forever! I will never see it again!"

I confessed to myself that I was not intelligent for all the above reasons, got a cart and went home with my balloon-less daughter.

But enough about me. How was YOUR day?