Out and About

Maddie and I took our first solo trip out last Friday afternoon. Just like Oz ("Knocked Up" blog on Babble.com), the first place we visited was Target. I was getting a little stir crazy by the end of last week. I'm a "get out of the house" sort of person and with it being November and Maddie being less than a month old, we've been staying in a lot. So by the end of last week, my fear of taking her out by myself was overridden by my need to get out of the house. I planned and debated all morning, replenished the diaper bag, fed and changed Maddie and loaded her up in the car. I took a huge breath as we backed out of the garage and for the first time in a long, long time, I actually drove the speed limit on Hwy. 63. A debate then started in my head that went something like this:

"Should I take Stadium Blvd. or I-70 to get to Target?"

"I-70 has much more traffic and I'll have to go through the I-70/63 connector where I might get into a major accident because accidents happen at that one spot. I could get hit by a big truck or by some crazy person not paying attention trying to swerve over in my lane."

"Maybe I should take Stadium instead. But wait, Stadium has lots of hills. What if Maddie's head falls forward if we have to stop at one of the stoplights on a hill. I won't be able to reposition it. She could suffer irreparable damage... be paralyzed for life. What should I do?"

"OK. I'll take Stadium. I'll just try to make it through all of the lights without stopping. If I have to stop, I'll just take off really, really slowly so Maddie's head doesn't fly off her shoulders."

This is the crazy stuff that rattles around the heads of new mothers. I'm sure all of you experienced mothers are having a good laugh right now.

We finally made it to the Target parking lot. I hauled the stroller out of the trunk and managed to get it unfolded. I then snapped Maddie and her car seat into the stroller and we headed into the store. Once instead, I breathed a huge sigh of relief. "Hey, this wasn't so bad. Maybe we won't be stuck in the house until Maddie is old enough to drive."

As we walked around the store, I looked down at Maddie sleeping in her seat and realized just how tiny she really is. She got lots of "Oh, what a cute baby" looks which helped my paranoia. I mean, who doesn't like to hear how cute their baby is, right? :)

Maddie was a real trooper. She did really well. We picked out her first Christmas stocking -- a green and white velvet stocking with Pooh and Piglet embroidered on it. We also found the elusive Bumble (the abominable snow beast from Rudolf the Red-Nosed Reindeer) ornament and snatched it up for Daddy. It will look great with Yukon Cornelius on our tree.

We made a quick lap around the mall and decided to head for home. This is when I had the stupidest idea I may have ever had. Things had gone so well that afternoon. I was drinking in the freedom of having a baby who seemed to travel well. I then made the fateful decision to stop at the grocery store on the way home. "We'll just run in and pick up a few things," I thought.

Inside the store, things were going fairly well until we got to the soup isle. Maddie started fussing and I offered her the magic green passie. I knew it was getting close to bottle time for Maddie and hoped the passie would work it's magic until we could get home. Maddie made it clear that she was not interested in Passie and that I had overextended this little adventure. She wanted to go home and have her bottle. NOW.

A meltdown ensued while a poor father-to-be in the same isle tried to strike up a conversation about becoming a parent. I wanted to tell him that this is what he had to look forward to but ended up mumbling something about how great it is while trying to free a red-faced Maddie from her car seat. She finally calmed down now that I was holding her. This is where I made my second fatal mistake. I should have packed her up and left the store right then and there, but I continued to shop.

We finally made it to the checkout counter where the checker began to tell me how much she would love to have another baby but she's a single mom now and working two jobs. She doesn't have any help. I told her I don't know how people do it by themselves (and I don't -- this little 7 lb. child was about to eat me alive). Another employee walked by and started gushing about how beautiful Maddie was. At this point, I was thinking, "Blah, blah. Just hurry up and let me get out of this store now before we have part two of Super Meltdown."

We finally paid and headed for the door. Maddie was returned to her car seat prison and barely held it together on the way to the car. I tossed the bags into the back seat, snapped her car seat into the base and closed the door so that I could return the cart to the little corral thing. When I get back to the car I can see that Maddie is screaming at the top of her lungs.

I get in the car and speed toward home, hoping that the local police don't catch me speeding and give me a ticket under their new zero-tolerance policy. I tried to talk calmly to Maddie but she would have nothing of it. As we approached our subdivision I hit the gas. "If the police want to stop me, they'll have to deal with this crying child in the backseat," I thought to myself. Maddie's crying soared to new levels. Her face was red. Tears were welling up in her eyes. I felt like the worst mother in the world.

We pulled into the garage, and I jumped out, grabbed Maddie and the bottle from the diaper bag and ran into the house. We sank into the big recliner in the living room and I plunged the bottle into Maddie's mouth hoping it would squelch the wails. Maddie finally calmed down enough to eat a little. Matt walked in a few minutes later and asked how our day went.

"Your daughter had a complete meltdown in the grocery store and it was all my fault."

Lesson learned. Don't mess with a hungry baby.