Baby Squared

When Nora and I were younger we had a really good compromise. We were allowed one junk food cereal in the house at a time and we could only have it on Saturday or Sunday, therefore naming it "weekend cereal." I think this came into effect when I was in Pre-K? It worked out great.

Yes, "druthers" is a made-up word composed of "I'd rather."  I think it started out as a joke and stuck.

I'll bite on the druthers question...

Your guess is kind of right, though it's an American phrase, and a contraction of "would rather."

www.phrases.org.uk/.../194850.html

I don't know if this is remotely possible in your situation, but is there any chance you could do some combo of shopping at a food co-op, or some sort of health food or organic store, and at the same time get some of your basics delivered from a big grocery store?

I hate big chain grocery stores. I hate their fluorescent lighting, and boxes of SpongeBob Squarepants PopTarts and big frozen food sections and shelves scientifically arranged to get you to buy the maximum amount of high-markup processed food. I have no doubt going in there with toddlers would be a nightmare, since I'm sure they put all the stuff that would be most tempting for the little ones exactly in their line of sight.

I'm lucky enough to have a big food co-op near my house, which specializes in bulk foods, organic produce, recycled paper products ... but what I love just as much is there are no products designed to appeal to the kiddos with TV or movie tie-ins.

Of course, there are occasionally things I need from the big chain that they don't stock at the co-op, so I usually order those things online and have them delivered (takes a small bit of advance planning, but it's soooo convenient).

Anyway, something to  consider ... I certainly don't envy you the trip to the store with two toddlers. Good luck!

I got pretty good at shopping at Walmart with my two two year olds.  The key is pack a baggie of goldfish and raisins for them to eat while you shop. You need to be done shortly after the goldfish run out.  The Walmart carts are bad and good. They are low down so they can't see all the stuff on the aisles as good but they are bad because they get bored just looking at each other and my stomach.  But still goldfish  help.  

Mine just act crazy in the produce area.  They start screeching and pointing at fruit like they have never had food before.  They are just fruit lovers.  Eric will start screaming out "MO NANAS MO NANAS!!!!"  when he sees the bananas.  ONce we leave that area they calm down.  

I will be doing grocery shopping alone or sending Micah now though because of flu season and swine flu.  I don't like exposing them to all the Walmart ickies this time of year.  I am actually kinda disapointed because I was feeling very proud of myself to get the shopping done without having to burden Micah at all.  Oh wells.

I've got a friend whose techique I admire in this area.  She lets each of her two boys pick out one thing in the store.  If it's a bag of disgusting, turn-your-fingers-orange nacho chips that have no business being in human stomachs, that's fine.  .)  (If there is a choice of sizes, you control that choiceBut that's also it.  One item per kid.  

My technique is less refined, and less effective.  I start out swearing to buy the healthy stuff, I agree with them that the abysmally named Dora "fruit rolls" are cute as I roll the cart on by, and when I can't take the begging and the pleading anymore, I mutter, "Fine, whatever, ruin your bodies, I don't care."  Then all three of us are cranky and no one wins.

I have tried my friend's technique a few times, and it's actually worked pretty well.  I don't know why I don't use it more often.

I hate taking Michael to the store.  He always acts up.  It's like he knows my options in public are limited by my fear of being reported to Child Protective Services...

As far as brand recognition, he has for some time expressed a preference for the "blue yogurt" over the Dora yogurt, except for the time when I stopped buying Dora yogurt, when he decided he wanted it again.  In the store he doesn't really pay attention that much, unless we're around toys.  he watches Noggin mostly, which doesn't have commercials, unless you count self-promotion for Nickolodeon.

Before I finished the doggie juice paragraph I was totally thinking you should say it was for dogs!

Sounds like a great "teachable moment." While little kids aren't going to understand why one yogurt is healthier than another or why you don't want to support the commercialization of the food industry, you can teach them that the packaging isn't all that important.

 What if you tried this: Tell them that you buy food that you know is good on the inside. Then when you get home (or even better if u can swing it, while in the store) let them color on a sheet of mailing labels and  decorate the packaging of your cereals, yogurts, etc. If that's too tricky, you could use stickers to decorate too.

P.S. If you want to have things delivered like wandergrrl suggested, I just heard about this website, www.alice.com. I haven't used it, but it sounds like a good deal.

There's a documentary on this subject -- we just watched it recently.

Consuming Kids: The Commercialization of Childhood

www.imdb.com/.../tt1337599

I have just kept explaining that the brands we buy are healthier.  Now that Evie is 5, she seems to understand it, and she actually explains it to other kids sometimes (which is a little embarrassing at friends' house, when she says "My mommy doesn't buy that kind of yogurt because it's not healthy").  Heh.

However, she does still ask - for some reason the "fruit snacks" with characters on the boxes always draw her attention.  I have explained that they don't actually have any fruit in them, but she ALWAYS asks for them.  I finally told her that we could buy fruit snacks, but only the kind that are made with real juice, and that they would count as "dessert" not "snacks" (which means she'd only get to eat them on the weekend).  If she had her dessert druthers, fruit snacks are high on the list, so it usually ends the conversation, but sometimes they end up in the cart.

Interestingly, I have tried to use the whole character advertising thing to my advantage: "Look!  Dora edamame!" but somehow she can tell which things are healthy and which aren't.

Shopping with small kids is an art form.  I have some stories you wouldn't believe.

I find keeping them busy helps (have them point out anything yellow for an aisle, or pick a letter of the day like 'B' and have them point out those--they start getting involved in something that's apart from anything commercial and they don't see it as much).

Our main strategy now is to make sure we have a list before we go.  That way I just shrug and say repeatedly, "It's not on the list."  Helps me not to impulse shop as much myself actually.

I have to second the Alice.com suggestion.  I love having everything delivered to my door especially with free shipping.  They don't have a lot of grocery store basics but they have a ton of toiletries and household products.  We live in Chicago and trying to get to someplace like Target for the essentials requires more time and patience than I can spare - especially with a 2 year old and a 6 month old.  

Forgot to mention that Evie also enjoys being in charge of our list.  She carries the list and a marker, and as we put things in the cart, she crosses them off the list.  (This requires my help, since she can't read yet.)  She likes to see how many things we already have and how many things we have left to buy.  It keeps her mind on something other than "impulse" buying.  (The funniest thing is that she yells at me if I put something in the cart that isn't on the list.)

There is no win-win in a big corporate supermarket (which is all there is in my town, like most towns). Usually, Noah winds unhappy because I've said no to about 100 things and I wind up unhappy because I've said yes to about three.

That said, a couple random tricks that sorta, kinda work:

* By some miracle, our Stop 'n Shop has a "healthy aisle" with all sorts of overpriced stuff designed to appeal to parents. My son DOES NOT KNOW that the "evil cereal" aisle exists. I don't know what I'll do when he finds out, but that's a problem for another day.

* It helps to have something they CAN do or have -- like your cookies. Noah gets an annoying plastic toy for 75 cents, courtesy of the gumball machine.

* We're in lying territory here, but if the real reason won't fly ("but Mommy, I LOOOVE sugar!"), I go with one that usually does, even if it makes no sense. "That has moo milk" (allergies) and "that's not part of our religion" (well, technically, it's NOT kosher, whatever it is; so what if nothing else in my grocery cart is either) are somehow valid while health is not.

My tactic: If I'm not in the mood for toddler antics (in the cart, out of the cart, fighting for a spot in the cart...) I go to one of the two stores nearby that has a kid drop off (for me, that's Fred Meyer or Top Food). If that's not an option, I give them a "talk" before we get in the store about what I expect from them - hard to believe, but it works like a charm! I love the idea of giving them a task (like holding the list), but for me, I always keep suckers in my purse just in case....

One more tactic my mom used to use. She would buy the Dora/Disney Princess/My little Pony/Strawberry Shortcake/ etc box of cereal once and then keep the box and replace the inner packet with healthier cereal.  That way I got to look at the prettier box without having to eat that crap.  She said I never would eat the kiddy kind.  I remember one time I ate Blue Smurf cereal and or vitamins or something and then vomited blue all over my mom's van.  Lovely.  

I recently read an article about shopping in a healthy way, and someone suggested sticking around the outside of the store--fruit, veg, dairy, meat--and skipping the inner aisles, where all the pre-packaged foods are.  Now, I know that this isn't always possible or desirable (and dammit, we like our fruit snacks), but I just don't spend that much time lingering in the aisles.  

In our old grocery store, we started in the dairy section and picked up cheese sticks first; then Harps would eat one as we shopped.  Our new store isn't set up like this, unfortunately.  About the package, though--it depends what it is, for me.  Sometimes Harps wants the Dora yogurt, but then she gets tired of it, and then she wants the squeezy YoBaby someone had at their house the other day.  The tricky parts for us are the baking aisle (chocolate chips!  Sugar sprinkles!) and the snacks (Pringles!  Goldfish!).  She knew what Pringles were at an early age...  I just started parking the cart at the end of the aisle, grabbing what I needed, and tossing it where she couldn't see it.  Then, we'd hit the live lobster tank, and all else would be forgotten...

(The 50 cent rocking cars or motorcycles, while annoying, are also a great diversion).

About co-ops--how about this ironic twist?  We're checking out of the local natural food store, and there's a container of ORGANIC LOLLIPOPS on the counter, which, of course, our heroine wants.  Badly.  No fancy packaging needed.

About the fibbing to your kids: absolutely not wrong to me! :-)

I've had a few incidents with my one: I've let him have the pack of yogurts, only to realize a few minutes later that he had opened the little metallic lids! Once, he also grabbed a tomato while I was choosing lettuce and basically ate it like an apple.

He whines for stuff too, chips, anything with Lighting McQueen on it, etc. But I guess he's been pretty good at accepting alternatives. What I usually do is tell him he can choose one thing, and he'll pick Goldfish, low-salt alphabet-shaped pretzels, organic fruit strips, or he even sometimes choose things I would get anyway, like organic yogurt shakes!

For cereals and such, I find he can still like the box of the unsugary ones. Earth's Best Organic have Sesame Street characters on them for instance, and so he's happy to take the "Elmo" cereal. There's also a natural brand with a puffin on them, and honestly I don't think he sees the difference between that and the Froot Loops toucan.

I also think distraction is the best asset in a grocery store: even if he's stuck on something he wants and I don't want to get, there's always something else that will interest him in another aisle...

At our Hannaford store, there's a nice bulk foods aisle.  I always stop there with Alex and get a bag full of yummy hemp granola, and then Alex gets to press the code into the scale so it'll print out the sticker for the register.  It even made me feel good about teaching him numbers...  :)

He's just about outgrown them now, but we did buy him "Elmo" meals -- those Earth's Best frozen pasta meals in the shape of Elmo's face (who can tell once it's cooked?  Geez), of which he likes the pasta and pretty much ignores the icky frozen vegetables.  Give him fresh vegetables that haven't been cooked into oblivion and he gobbles them up, and he loves Amy's vegetarian shepherd's pie.  Is it any wonder that kids hate vegetables when they're all grey and mooshy instead of crisp and green?