How do you keep yours entertained at the grocery store?

Polofsky

I just wanted to see if anyone had any creative ideas. My twins are about 21 mos old. Usually we go with snacks and grab 2 carts. Sometimes we split up the list and try to get it done faster that way and sometimes we go up and down the aisles together and one cart holds all the food while the other cart has both kids. But either way, they usually lose it halfway through and we end up with crying babies. Occassionally we just have one of us stay at home with the kids so we don't have to take them at all but that's not always possible. It's not like we spend an hour at the store....we are pretty speedy shoppers and can get in and out in about 30 minutes and we only go once a week.

sara1014

Mine might be weird, but they LOVE the grocery store.  They see it and immediately start saying, "HEB! HEB! HEB!"  

I keep them very entertained by making them a part of the shopping experience. Telling them what we're getting, we always stop and look at the lobsters, I let them smell the produce that we're buying, etc.  We also have, on the weekends, some very eccentric sample people.  One lady sings, the sushi sample guy yells out about "Suuuuuuuushi Saaaaaaaaaaaaamples".  But I'm not sure if that is the norm for other grocery stores.  Our grocery chain in town has virtually no competition, but they make shopping as enjoyable as possible which I think has made it easier on us with the kids.  

 

sunnybrook.

I do 95% of the grocery shopping alone with the girls. I don't bring snacks unless it will be a long shopping trip (1 hour).

At Publix, they ride in the double seat shopping cart the store purchased for me. We stop at the deli, they get a slice of cheese. We stop at the bakery, they get a cookie to split. I point out balloons, fruit, photos on posters/displays, etc. They help put things in bags, hold my shopping list, non-breakable items, wave at babies, etc. We've not had any problems.

At Wal-Mart, I push them in the stroller and pull the shopping cart. Since I can't engage them like I usually do, they get more fussy. I'll give them snacks and things to hold and try to talk to them. If they cry or fuss, they just have to suck it up. There's just no other option for me and they need to learn that crying won't get them goodies or make us leave. 

doz&koz

Mine are a lot younger than yours, but an idea I've thought of for the future is to get them to "help".  Maybe give them each their own list with pictures and make them responsible for getting those items.  So maybe one child has a list with pictures of milk, bread, and their favorite cereal and the other has a list with pictures of apple juice, bananas, a box of macaroni and cheese.  I have no idea if this will work, I was just trying to think about how to handle this situation in the future.

groovygrl

We do most of our grocery shopping with out them (on our way home from work before picking them up or whatever) so when they do go, it is sort of new & fun since it is not a frequent thing (they both go together maybe once every 3 weeks or so and sometimes one of us will take one of them on a weekend or something). When we have them together we try to get those 'fun' carts with the steering wheels etc but sometimes we split up... they love hte samples in the deli/bakery section, and I mostly just talk & ask them what they see & they point out stuff, etc. We also try to whip through in 20 min b/c they get antsy around then. If we split up I do 2 lists by section, that way we're not both all over the store and can focus on the stuff on our list. Thankfully so far it hasn't been bad w/ them....yet...

atc282

They love the double carts at our various stores--if one starts fighting with the other, I put one down below (in the little tykes attached car--they have these at Kroger, and keep one up in the double slot facing me). At Kroger, they also have tv carts where they play Mickey Mouse Club, Handy Manny or Veggie Tales for them inside a car cart! They LOVE that!

I admit that I let them snack the entire shopping trip. I just clean up the cart as we're checking out. They don't wh

atc282

oops...

anyway, they love to eat the samples they put out or split a banana or bagel, etc. Keeps them happy and it allows me to get my shopping done.