When I took all four children grocery shopping the other day I got quite the reaction out of several people. One guy had his daughter with him who looked about 6 or 7 years old. He saw me pushing a cart with four toddlers he just stopped and stared. I smiled at him and with an astonished look on his face he said, "And I thought I had my hands full!" then he continued to stare, so his daughter counted the kids and said, "four, Dad, there's four." He said, "I know, I can count. Wow!"
Another couple watched me as I was bagging our groceries. Three of the children were trying to "help" but it was making things go slowly. Anyway, the wife asked how old the children were, and I told her. The husband said, "How do you do it?" I said, "A lot of patience and a lot of energy."
One lady that I had seen in a store last week and also this morning said to me that every since she saw me last week she just kept thinking how does she (referring to me) get anything done? I told her that's all I do is take care of them.
Another lady saw me and said with a little disgust, "Please tell me they're not all the same age."
An older cashier at wal-mart just assumed the older three were triplets and was telling me all about another set of triplets that comes into the store.
As I was leaving the WIC office one day I heard people talking behind me saying something like, "she sure has her hands full, but she's got a lot of patience too." That was nice to hear after wrestling with four toddlers through a WIC appointment I was about ready to pull my hair out inside, but luckily was staying calm on the outside. It was nice hear someone notice that I was doing a good job.
Jessica I totally hear you. It is amazing isn't it?? You're amazing!!!
ReplyDeletePeople can be so silly! I think your a wonderful mama!
ReplyDeleteIt's too bad people have negative things to say. I'm sure you're doing great! I think it's odd that people are so surprised to see someone with several small children in tow. Maybe I'm too used to Utah where half the women in the store have 3 kids or so along. Are there way fewer people out there with a bunch of little kids? I had a couple people give me kinda funny looks today at the store and I only had 3 kids with me and they are reasonably far apart in age.
ReplyDeleteI wonder if so few people have lots of kids these days that it's just odd to see anyone who's willing to handle the work load of several small children.
I'm sure it does take up all your time like you said! I find I can't get much of anything done anymore either now that I have a newborn and two other kids.
Good luck staying on top of things and with growing a tough "skin" to ward off the comments people send your way! ( :
This is so funny that you posted this. I've been slowly collecting all the crazy/mean/thoughtless things people say to ME in public for a blog post. It helps me not take it too seriously if I can blog about it. Glad to know there's someone else out there dealing with these wonderful comments!
ReplyDelete