Shopping with a Tween BOY

Two words: not. fun.

I had to take Mark pants shopping because pretty much all of his pants are too short. *He* claims he doesn't care, but darn it, *I* care, so he was GOING. I had to utilize pretty much my entire bag of tricks, including cajoling, reasoning, a little bit of yelling, and threatening to sew three inches of flowery material to the bottoms of all the pants that don't fit. And HE responds with his preteen arsenal of pouting, whining, MUCH rolling of eyes and complaining. Finally I just put my foot down and said Get in the car. Now.

So we arrive at JCPenney, and Mark starts laying down rules for me. We're in, we're out. NO looking around anywhere else. Pants and that's IT. Five minutes tops (excuse me while I convulse in laughter at that one. Five minutes? Is he kidding?).

To my credit, throughout Penney's AND TJMaxx (which, might I add, is pretty much my favorite store after Home Depot, and yes I realize I am weird and did I mention TJ's had a new stock of purses in and I didn't even LOOK?) I stuck to the rules of only looking at boyclothes. (and menclothes, sigh...my little boy! sob, sob) (well, I *did* look at other boy clothes besides pants, but just hooded sweatshirts, which he loves.) (ok, a slight fib. I went to another department in TJ's to pick up a specific item, but I looked neither left nor right on my way there, just went straight to it, picked it up, straight back to Mark who was picking out pants)

OK, exiting the land of entirely too many parentheses.

Another battle ensued when Mark realized he had to actually TRY THE PANTS ON. ALL of them. He eventually gave in on it, of course, when I told him if he didn't I would start looking at ladies' underwear.

So we finished up our shopping trip with a total of four new pairs of jeans and a hooded sweatshirt. (and here is where I scream in delight about the amazing find at JCP: two pairs of jeans in SLIM for $1.66 each!!! one.dollar.and.sixty.six.cents. I was THRILLED.)

So after all of that, which wound up being about an hour and a half, we kind of staggered into the Chinese buffet for lunch, a little dazed and a lot exhausted. *He* perked right up at the sight of so much food. *I* just wanted to go home and collapse. (but after the buffet, though. I loooove chinese)

Watching him as he so excitedly went back for yet another plate (and hear this: my boy was going back specifically because he wanted "Oh boy! Cantaloupe!" although they were out and he settled for watermelon with a side of fried potato wedges, oh my), my heart was just overflowing with love for him. He really is such a good boy. He's just growing up so darn fast. He's less than an inch shorter than I am at this point, but in so many ways he's still so little, inside that gangly body with the big feet. It's easy to forget that he's only eleven. But "only" eleven when I remember him at six, at two, at newborn ohmygosh. That's when I look twice and am stunned that this giant creature was once inside me. My boy. My precious, precious boy. And this tidal wave of love just crashes over me.

But that DOESN'T mean I want to go shopping with him again anytime soon. mk