Tantrum-Free Target Tuesday

Yes, I am back to my infatuation with alliteration.

Today has been one pretty terrific Tuesday, although I have to say that even I am a tad amazed at being able to say that after getting Reiss home from preschool and experiencing tantrum after tantrum....and that was just the first ten minutes after arriving home.

We got home and Reiss didn't want to come in the house. Then he got mad at his drink for dripping water on his jacket and pants. Stupid sippy cup! I tried to explain that his jacket wouldn't have gotten water on it had he taken it off when I asked. I left out the part that it would have been his shirt that got wet had his jacket been off but whatever...moving on. He then threw a fit because there were only two things (salami and pineapple chunks) on his plate and not four things and that's when I got the peas and corn out of the fridge. Then it was his peas that were the cause of his upset. Darn things kept falling off the plate.....after he kept pushing them to the edge, of course.

We all ate lunch and Reiss kept asking for more peas. Yes, I know that is probably a dream for most parents! So he kept asking for more peas and I kept piling them on his plate. He was ignoring his salami slices though, so I had to start bribing him into eating one slice of salami per one more spoonful of peas. I'm all for eating peas but we have GOT to get protein in the boy too!

As Reiss ate more and more, his mood started to lighten. When he finished, I gave him a big hug and made a big ta-da out of how well he ate and he seemed pretty content. After getting his cup refilled and some shoes and socks on Milla, it was off to Target we went.

For some odd reason, there are certain stores where - as soon as we pull into the parking lot - Reiss will begin yet another tantrum about how he doesn't want to go into that store. Target is one of those stores. But Target is where I have found the "pretty girls" (what Reiss calls Milla's hairbands and bows) I like to buy for Milla and she has been in need of more of them for a few weeks now. I've been talking for days now about going to buy more pretty girls and, as a result, Reiss has also been saying "Wanna go buy more pretty girls." After a quick glance in my rearview mirror, I caught the beginning of Reiss getting a big birdie lip and a few tears and then there was the whining, "Don't wanna go in this store. Don't like this place."

Before I go any further, a little history.....Typically, I do not try to accomodate tantrums in ways in which I think doing so will make Reiss think he is being rewarded for bad behavior. However, having said that, I will fess up to several occasions when I have left a store's parking lot at the first sign of him throwing a fit about not wanting to go wherever we are going. Seriously...why fight about it? The most likely outcome is going to be that his fit escalates into an all-out tantrum and taking that kind of behavior into the store with me just isn't something I want to do.

Today was not going to be any different as far as me wanting to haul Reiss into a store kicking and screaming so I tried the only thing I could think of at the time to try to avert the inevitable tantrum: I lied.

I told Reiss that Target was the only place we could get pretty girls. Yes, it was a lie but I knew it was his currency for getting us in the door tantrum-free since he's been talking about buying pretty girls for days. Much to my surprise, it worked! He said, "Wanna go buy pretty girls." It was like clouds moved, skies opened up, the sun came out bold and bright, and a chorus could be heard.......LAAAAAAA!!! There are no words to describe it - I really think I was in shock.

Records were probably broken for the amount of time it took me to get the stroller out, Milla strapped in, Reiss out of the truck and into the store. We walked - yes, I said walked - around Target. Reiss didn't run even once. Maybe it was the stern warning (or maybe it was warnings since I probably told him at least twelve times) I gave him that he was to hold my hand in the parking lot and the stroller in the store or we would leave IMMEDIATELY. He did not hold my hand or the stroller the entire time in the store but he did not run from me even one time. I'll say it again: He did not run.

To any parent of a typical child I'm sure this doesn't seem significant at all but this was BIG for us. This is one of the very reasons I don't go out a whole lot during the day without my husband to help because Reiss runs from me wherever we go. The stroller is of no use because getting him into it without a tantrum is next to impossible but more important, he knows how to undo the straps. The harness/backpack restraint/leash/call-it-whatever-you-want thing is useless because - like the stroller - he throws a tantrum at even the mention of it and in the rare instance I can get it on him, he can get it off.

We casually walked around and looked at things and for the very first time since Reiss was young enough to not put up a fight about being in the stroller, I actually felt like a regular parent out for a no-stress trip to Target picking up a few items we needed and some we didn't. It was an amazing feeling. We did have some of the token harassing back and forth between Reiss and Milla - Reiss grabbing Milla's arm...Milla grabbing Reiss's glasses if he got too close to her...Reiss pulling Milla's pretty girls out of her hair - but otherwise, it was actually (dare I say it???) relaxing to just walk and look at things and get to shop.

On a side note, Reiss has been carrying around a little leather business card protector that James received as a promotional item from a hospital for which he did some work. Until last night when James got Reiss a real men's wallet, the business card protector served as a wallet for Reiss because Reiss has to do everything like Daddy.

Have I ever mentioned that Reiss's glasses do not have real lenses in them? Daddy wears glasses and because Reiss has to do everything like Daddy, for awhile he was wearing a pair of safety glasses. That is, until grandma went and got him a real set of frames with fake lenses.

Anyway, as usual, getting off-track here....So Reiss was carrying the business card protector around Target because I didn't want him to lose the real wallet and my thinking ahead was a darn good thing because he lost the business card protector. We paid for our stuff at Target before I discovered this and then we back-tracked our steps without success in finding the protector. We drove the stroller over to the customer service desk and someone had actually found it and turned it in.

Now, call me cynical but I really didn't expect someone to turn a lost item in to customer service - not even a worthless little business card protector. So, in addition to getting my mommy mojo back, our Target trip was also a lesson for me in keeping a level of faith and trust in our fellow mankind to do even the most trivial, unexpected favor of honesty.