A Good Way to Start 2008

Happy New Year!

Katrina put my hat and scarf on and pranced around the house singing joyfully.

Katrina eating her first "go-gurt" from ALDI today where she proved a great "helper."

Today we went grocery shopping at ALDI. I have found in the past few months that our grocery bills are WAY less if I am able to purchase a bulk of our groceries at ALDI. Well, needless to say, it is not a good place to take an almost-two-year-old. But, when there is no bread, no tortillas and no spaghetti sauce in the house, things are dire and you will do just about anything.

So, we went to ALDI. She did an excellent job in the cart and the check-out girl was overly gracious and used the cart that Katrina was already in to load our groceries. Then comes the fun part: putting the groceries that have been thrown into the cart in a VERY haphazard way into bags or boxes. Well, Katrina wanted to help. In fact she even said, "Help" in the cutest voice you can think of. So, being the "let's stop and smell the roses" Mom that I want to be in 2008, I let her help with 100% of the groceries. I sidled the cart up to the counter and handed her each item (all 100 of them, or at least it seemed!) and she did her best to toss it into the box I designated for it. I got LOTS of stares and many smiles, but it was worth it. Katrina was SO proud of herself and I was proud of myself too. Who cares if we were there for 20 minutes longer than we needed to be? It was worth it to allow her to feel like a helper. Then I out-did myself and took her to PetSmart. She gets SO excited when we are driving in the parking lot of that place! Unfortunately today there were no cats, but there was a dog getting a haircut so it was worth the 10 minute walk-through, saying "hello" and "bye" to each and every gerbil, hamster and guinea pig. I love Katrina dearly and today was a day that started out rough (she awoke for the day at 3:45 AM for reasons we are still not aware of), but ended GREAT! We made some wonderful memories. She is getting so big and I don't want these days to pass me by without creating memories like today.