This morning Everly decided to get up a bit early, and I kicked Jason out of bed early to help get her all set for the day. This gave me some time so I could have a moment to put my face on and get directions. After her morning nap we hit the road to go paint some mugs at Colour Me Mine. Tairalyn (from Little Miss Mama) had the brilliant idea to go paint mugs for Mug Up, and invited us to join her and her daughter. These two seriously have the best curly hair!
It was such a nice start to the day. I always find artsy stuff relaxes me. Everly happily sat in the stroller while I painted away. (I have to say I am so thankful for our awesome stroller, it just rolls right up to tables and is the perfect height for little ones to see what is going on.) Everly and I both enjoyed meeting new people and making some new friends. Everly loved getting to people watch, eat her puffs and drink her bottle, while bopping along to the music on the radio.
Little Miss checking my work to make sure it was all ok.
Mr and Mrs Fox mug
If you’ve never done paint your own pottery, its really fun and easy. A great little outing for munchkins. You pick the piece you would like to pant, the places always have a variety of price ranges so its easy to stay in a price range you feel ok with. Then you figure out what you’d like to do on your item, for my mug I drew on my picture with a pencil. Then its off to find the colours. Start with the background, and go from lightest to darkest for colours. You cannot go over black. Depending on the look you are going for, you may need to do as many as 3 to 4 coats to cove it so its a solid colour once fired in the kiln.
I cannot wait to see how all of our items turn out. You will have to check out Little Miss Mama to see what they did, I’m sure she will have some photos up too.
Everly’s look of disgust sums up how we were both feeling towards the end of our Ikea trip.
After pottery and painting mugs, we were off to Ikea. I was hoping Miss Mugs would fall asleep in the car for a nap, but she didn’t. Stubborn little monkey today. There were so many emergency vehicles passing us it was nuts, I think this was part of why she didn’t nap, I counted multiple vehicles pulled over, and one accident. I should have taken it as a sign to not go to Ikea and to just go home.
The store was crazy, apparently today was a Pro-D day (oops how could I have forgotten that), it was full of parents and their kids. Everly did great waiting in line for me to get our lunch, she was content playing with the applesauce container. We lucked out in finding a spot too eat over by the kids area so it wasn’t too loud or distracting for Everly. I found what I initially had wanted to get, but I also found two bonus items. Two more chairs, the same as what we got a few months back, in the clearance section again! I called Jason to ask if I should grab them, and was given the go ahead. The last thing he told me was to go and find help since he knew Everly was in the stroller with me. One employee spotted me seeking help right away and brought over a flat trolley for me to put the chairs on. Before I could ask for more help, he had disappeared.
I struggled pulling the stroller and pushing the cart, and switched my plan of attack multiple times. I asked a couple employees for help along the way. On a normal day it probably wouldn’t have been so rough to get around, but remember Pro-D day people everywhere. I was promptly told “No” each time I spoke to an employee. I got to one till and then had an employee shove in front of me, and tell me I needed to go to a different till, alrighty then… thanks. I asked if they would help me to the next till and was quickly told “No” again. Off we went in a juggling act to the next till. Once we finally got to the cashier I asked again if there was any way I could get help. I was first told no again, and then told “Well, you could go all the way down the end of the hall way to home delivery and see if they will help.” I finally was given a suggestion at least! A sucky suggestion, but it was something. What a show we must have been for all those who just watched me struggle going past, looking for help. When we did get to the home delivery area there was no body there!!! I waited 5+ minutes, buy this time Everly was not a happy camper. I surrendered and some how managed to get our train of flat trolley, stroller, and grumpy/disappointed mommy rolling again, and to the elevator. The parking lot was a whole other craziness. Once more I ended up passing some employees, who just looked at me like I was crazy, and did not offer to help, though I was clearly struggling along and needed some assistance. At this point I just didn’t care any more, I wanted to get to the car. I had started to cry.
I was so done with Ikea.
Getting everything to, and into the car was a feat all of its own. It’s not that I couldn’t have done it on my own, I did manage obviously. Its the fact that I felt like I had to put myself, and more so my daughter in danger while trying to get to the car with my purchase when in the parking lot. That is what pushed me over the edge. There were several opportunities where a staff member could have simply offered to help me push the trolley to the car. I was told “No” repeatedly, and was just looked at. I ended up losing it in the car and started balling my eyes out. I called Jason to help me calm down and tell him about what all just went down. Don’t know if I will be shopping at Ikea again any time soon… at least not without another set of hands.