Wanted: Gluey shoes

Yesterday Noah and I made a solo trip to the mall. I wanted to go to Plymouth Meeting to check out H&M's baby clothes and the family restroom. For the most part our trip was successful. There was only one ten minute period where I felt exhausted, exasperated and moronic for attempting to go to the mall alone. I'm sure that is the time period you'd most like to hear about. I'll take you there.

I'm hungry because I haven't eaten any lunch. I decide to peruse the food court. Up until now Noah has been staring slack-jawed at the sights and sounds of commerce from the safety of the Bjorn. I order a six inch veggie delight meal from Subway. We sit down at a low wooden table surrounded by benches - more living room decor than food court. I start chomping away and Noah is watching the carousel. All the sudden he lets out a tortured wail. He's crying hysterically. It was idiotic hubris to think I could actual sit STILL and eat. I'm trying to get him out of the Bjorn. But the damn buttons are stuck. I can't get him out. I'm pushing and tugging, getting red in the face, and he's crying. I finally get him out and while I try to calm him down the snaps on my nursing bra pop open (for the millionth freakin' time!). After several different positions I decide the best way to calm him down is to take him to the bathroom, change him and nurse him. But the problem is that now I'm holding him with my hands - and my purse, my shopping bag, my lunch and the Bjorn are scattered about. I try to gather things with one hand but it's a no go. So I set him on the wood seat to gather things up - and I'm so worried he's going to pick now as the best time to roll. Once I get everything together I make a dash for the food court bathroom. When I get there not only do I realize that this is not the nursing bathroom I have heard tale of, but also I realize that in the path from the table to the bathroom Noah has lost a shoe. His new adorable shoes. I abandon my soda which I bought for the caffeine but haven't had one sip of and we start to backtrack. So he's still whimpering, I'm trying to hold all the crap and him, and I'm perusing the floor. Luckily another mother comes to our aid. Bless her. In the minute and a half from the time it fell off his foot until the time I started looking for it - someone picked the shoe up off the floor and just set it atop one of the counters. This of course made it harder to find because I'm looking on the floor. But soon we find the shoe. And all the action and hubbub has quieted Noah - we are back on the move and that makes him happy. The fiasco ends as I find the family restroom and diaper and feed our hero before returning to shopping.

The rest of the trip was fine, but I might think twice about going it alone again. It would have been a million times easier with another set of hands. Oh - and I wasn't that impressed with the family restroom (dirty and smelled like piss) or the H&M (nothing decent on sale). But Noah scored a few items of clearance clothing at Children's Place and Baby Gap.

After the mall adventure we went to Qtown to visit Super Oma and Grandpa Joe. My Dad asked if I wanted him to cook or if we should go out for dinner. After an already busy day I thought it best we stay in. Plus Dad is a good cook! For the first time I saw signs that Noah might be a little too attached to me. When Oma and Dad tried to hold him for longer than a minute or two he would start to fuss. And he would calm down as soon as I took him. It might have partly been because he was sleepy from being short on his typical naps. But he definitely didn't want to me to be out of sight or even out of reach. In a way that feels nice, in another way it's a concern. For the most part the kid sees me all day every day, you'd think he'd want a break. "Hey lady, don't you got no place to go?"

And all the driving? Yesterday it was a piece of pie. He slept through it all. Even when I had to get off the Blue Route at Norristown and fill up because I was worried I was going to run out of gas. But we finally made it home. And Mark was almost as happy to see us as we were to see him.