Beating the heat at the mall

(they never both look at the camera at the same time!!)

I wasn't actually going to post this but I just got an e-mail from my friend Julie who apparently is having back trouble and passing the time by reading blogs, not a bad way to pass the time, so Julie here was our afternoon yesterday:-

We went to the mall so Kate could play in the play area, she is very into the mall play areas right now. About a week ago I took Kate and Sara to the Northridge mall to get Sara's 1yr pictures taken at JC Penny's (will post as soon as I get them back, they did turn out super cute!), I promised Kate that after she had been really good whilst Sara got her pictures taken we would play in the play area, so we did and we hadn't been there 5 minutes when I smelt a disgustingly poopy diaper, you know the mommy nose you can smell one a mile away. Anyway, I detected the culprit to be none other than my darling Sara, I had no diapers with me and so poor Kate, we had to leave but only as I profusely promised to take her to the mall the following week to play and the mall with the carousel she could ride. It was a kind of bribery I know but she had been sooo very good and I felt guilty that she had only been able to play for 5 minutes. So, that brings me to yesterday. I go through my change jar and find $4 in quarters for the carousel, $2 for each girl to ride. We get there, park and get to the carousel only to find out that in June they put up their prices and its now $3 to ride (as if $2 wasn't ripping us off enough!!). I resign my self to the fact that just Kate will have to ride and I will deal with my guilt as poor Sara watches Kate go round and round later. I get her a token and explain to the lady I am just going to leave Sara a moment in the stroller whilst I put Kate on the carousel, she looks at Kate and tells me she is not big enough to ride on her own and that I would have to stand next to her, I tell the lady that I don't have enough cash for a token for Sara, she so kindly explains to me that I can stand next to Kate and hold Sara as long as I don't put her on a horse - if you know Sara she has to do everything like her big sis and I knew she'd have a fit if I was to just stand and hold her. I tell Kate that we can't ride today as I didn't bring enough money and she had tears streaming down her little face, my heart broke. Ding, ding!! there was a Target right there in the mall, I could go and purchase something and get cash back, wahooo, things are looking up. We go into Target and Kate tells me she needs to go potty, we go to find the potty and its too late, she couldn't quite hold all of it in, so another good thing we are in Target, we go and buy new pants, get the cash back whilst paying for the pants and Sara and Kate get to ride the carousel. Then they played in the play area, it was super crowded but my girls were happy so its fine, I'm happy. For the future though I think I'm sticking to the Northridge mall, its got a bigger play area and no carousel!!