I Am A Horrible Mother, Part II

I love ice cream.

My motto is "A day without ice cream is like a day without sunshine"

I'd say this is new thing, but I'd be lying. Ice cream is a huge part of my youth. I can still remember that as a small child, my parents would take me to Baskin Robbins for ice cream. I'd get Mint Chip, my Mom Jamoca (the best coffee ice cream ever), and my Dad would get Strawberry. I had countless birthday parties at Farrell's Ice Cream Parlour and picked many plastic animals out of many a Zoo Sundae.

My love of ice cream even influenced my first job, I worked at Baskin Robbins. I wasn't even 16 when I started at the neighborhood Baskin Robbins. (Circa really ugly polyester brown, pink and orange striped dresses.) By the time I left for college, I was their primary cake decorator and longest tenured employee. I ran the store when the owners went on vacation including taking care of payroll. (a lot of responsibility for an 18 year old) My first year at college, I would come back to the store for the holidays, primarily Valentine's Day and Mother's Day, anytime they needed back up with the huge number of cakes. One Valentine's Day we filled 500 cake orders. I made about 5000 roses over four days to put on those cakes. I came back to help and make some extra cash sure, but there was the added bonus of two free scoops per shift.

More recently, when I was pregnant with the boys, my consumption of ice cream increased dramatically. I don't drink milk, so my excuse was, I NEEDED ice cream so I could get enough calcium!!! And then I was lactating, so well, I REALLY NEEDED my calcium!!!!!!!

In my effort to reduce my calorie intake, I've started eating the Breyer's Slow Churn. It's super yummy, and it's supposed to have fewer calories and fat. I haven't looked because I'm pretty sure if I knew, I would have to make the painful decision to remove the sunshine from my day.

Anyway...back to why I am such a horrible mother. The other day, I needed to pick up a few things at the store. I generally do my shopping in small bits, it's highly inefficient, but I usually have the boys with me and I buy what I can fit in the stroller. I've tried the pulling the cart behind me trick and well, my heels came away bruised and bloody. We went to the store specifically for yogurt for Ryan, Eggs for Ryan and a few last minute things for dinner that night. When we got there I found that Ryan's Dino bites were on sale ($4.99) I picked up 10 bags, stroller getting really full now. Then I saw that Breyer's was on sale, buy one get one free. I got four containers. (that should last a couple of weeks) I had no room in the baskets for all this ice cream, so I put two containers on top of the sunshades. I thought about asking the boys to hold them, but I decided that their hot little hands might melt my sunshine. We were packed, I couldn't carry another thing. The problem, I still needed eggs. Ryan only had 4 more, that's two days of breakfast. I weighed my options, put two of the containers of ice cream back and get Ryan's eggs, or make a real effort to get back to the store before we have a breakfast crisis.

I'm ashamed to admit, I chose my own joy, above the nutrition of my child.

But as one of our nurses once told me..."If Mama ain't happy, ain't no one happy." That's my motto and I'm sticking to it.

BTW: Ryan got his eggs, and I'm having a bit of sunshine.