MoM's Sale
My life would be very different without the twins. I wouldn’t have as much to blog about for starters. Or maybe I’d have more to blog about because I could actually leave the house during the day without them. Either way, this blog is unquestionably different because of the twins, if for no other reason than because the title is longer.
One of the biggest changes to my life is a sharp reduction in the number of garage sales I attend. Last year I was a garage sale connoisseur, a regular, a whore if you will. This year I generally don’t leave the house without adult help unless a medical visit is involved, and even then it has to entail the prevention or eradication of a highly infectious disease. Garage sales don’t involve diseases, although some could involve the transmission of them, so I don’t plan on ever leaving the house to attend one by myself. This will usually limit my attendance to weekend sales when Ellie is available to help watch the kids, and we need to leave the house early to prevent all those whores from snapping up the good stuff.
Today was an exception. It was the first day of the area’s Mother’s of Multiples garage sale, an event big enough to require the use of a church to supply a room large enough for the sale, and a parking lot large enough for the crowds. I conned Ellie into being tardy for work* so she could help watch the kids while I, er, we shopped. This meant we had to be out of the house early so she could be as minimally tardy as possible.
I set my alarm for the twins’ schedule wake time, 7:15am, and actually woke up with it instead of sleeping for an extra half-hour like normal. I stuffed the twins full of milk, Ellie changed and fed Abbie, and we rushed everyone out the door as the sale opened its doors.
Ellie drove separately so she could leave early, and arrived at the sale a few minutes before us due to the fact that she drives really fast, and I drive like I’ve got three kids in the backseat. She met me in the parking lot. When I expressed surprise that she wasn’t inside looking around, she said she already looked around, but it was “a little crazy.” Amateur.
I pushed the twins in their stroller into the building and sidled up to the tables. At first I felt guilty about sucking up so much space at the table with the double-stroller, but when I realized the stroller was preventing others from looking at large chunks of used clothes before I could rifle through them, my guilt eased. I assumed this would be my big garage sale expedition of the year, so I piled clothes high on the stroller’s handlebars, accumulating what would turn into three shopping bags stuffed with clothes with a total cost equivalent to almost ten gallons of gasoline.
Ellie left after I hit two tables, giving me no choice but to pay and leave. The checkout line was long of course, leaving me plenty of time to watch the surroundings, interact with other shoppers, and smell Abbie’s poopy diaper. Being at a Mother’s of Multiples function is a little surreal; generally having twins makes us a novelty, but twins were everywhere this morning. One apprehensive future mother of twins, who looked to be barely far enough along to have had her first ultrasound, asked my advice on strollers and if I liked our stroller. I told her I did, and gave her a synopsis of front-and-back double strollers vs. side-to-side. Another mother went into a mini-crisis mode after her baby spit-up. She frantically searched for a wipe or tissue to clean the mess; fortunately I saved her day with a napkin from the bottom of my stroller. This brought the first of many comments I heard about what a great dad I was for taking all the kids to a garage sale that was “a little crazy.” And I thought I was just being frugal by filling out the kids’ wardrobe with used clothes before mom could fill it with retail clothes.
I paid and whisked everyone back to the car, ready to return home to store the loot and change a diaper. On the way out I ran into the apprehensive future mother again, this time waiting at the door for a set of triplet babies to come in. They were in a side-by-side-by-side stroller, and were struggling to fit through the double-doors. I told the future mother that’s what I didn’t like about the side-by-side variety.
* She only had a conference to attend today anyway. Pfftt.
** I didn’t have a clean diaper or wipes for Abbie, but I did have a napkin for a stranger.
One of the biggest changes to my life is a sharp reduction in the number of garage sales I attend. Last year I was a garage sale connoisseur, a regular, a whore if you will. This year I generally don’t leave the house without adult help unless a medical visit is involved, and even then it has to entail the prevention or eradication of a highly infectious disease. Garage sales don’t involve diseases, although some could involve the transmission of them, so I don’t plan on ever leaving the house to attend one by myself. This will usually limit my attendance to weekend sales when Ellie is available to help watch the kids, and we need to leave the house early to prevent all those whores from snapping up the good stuff.
Today was an exception. It was the first day of the area’s Mother’s of Multiples garage sale, an event big enough to require the use of a church to supply a room large enough for the sale, and a parking lot large enough for the crowds. I conned Ellie into being tardy for work* so she could help watch the kids while I, er, we shopped. This meant we had to be out of the house early so she could be as minimally tardy as possible.
I set my alarm for the twins’ schedule wake time, 7:15am, and actually woke up with it instead of sleeping for an extra half-hour like normal. I stuffed the twins full of milk, Ellie changed and fed Abbie, and we rushed everyone out the door as the sale opened its doors.
Ellie drove separately so she could leave early, and arrived at the sale a few minutes before us due to the fact that she drives really fast, and I drive like I’ve got three kids in the backseat. She met me in the parking lot. When I expressed surprise that she wasn’t inside looking around, she said she already looked around, but it was “a little crazy.” Amateur.
I pushed the twins in their stroller into the building and sidled up to the tables. At first I felt guilty about sucking up so much space at the table with the double-stroller, but when I realized the stroller was preventing others from looking at large chunks of used clothes before I could rifle through them, my guilt eased. I assumed this would be my big garage sale expedition of the year, so I piled clothes high on the stroller’s handlebars, accumulating what would turn into three shopping bags stuffed with clothes with a total cost equivalent to almost ten gallons of gasoline.
Ellie left after I hit two tables, giving me no choice but to pay and leave. The checkout line was long of course, leaving me plenty of time to watch the surroundings, interact with other shoppers, and smell Abbie’s poopy diaper. Being at a Mother’s of Multiples function is a little surreal; generally having twins makes us a novelty, but twins were everywhere this morning. One apprehensive future mother of twins, who looked to be barely far enough along to have had her first ultrasound, asked my advice on strollers and if I liked our stroller. I told her I did, and gave her a synopsis of front-and-back double strollers vs. side-to-side. Another mother went into a mini-crisis mode after her baby spit-up. She frantically searched for a wipe or tissue to clean the mess; fortunately I saved her day with a napkin from the bottom of my stroller. This brought the first of many comments I heard about what a great dad I was for taking all the kids to a garage sale that was “a little crazy.” And I thought I was just being frugal by filling out the kids’ wardrobe with used clothes before mom could fill it with retail clothes.
I paid and whisked everyone back to the car, ready to return home to store the loot and change a diaper. On the way out I ran into the apprehensive future mother again, this time waiting at the door for a set of triplet babies to come in. They were in a side-by-side-by-side stroller, and were struggling to fit through the double-doors. I told the future mother that’s what I didn’t like about the side-by-side variety.
* She only had a conference to attend today anyway. Pfftt.
** I didn’t have a clean diaper or wipes for Abbie, but I did have a napkin for a stranger.
posted by Matt at
10:46 PM
1 Comments:
I LOVE those garage sales! And I normally HATE any kind of garage sale. Guess that's what having three kids to clothe does to a person.
By
Becky, at 12:11 PM
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