Day 1,701 - The Cake Mix

As my kids get older, I find myself trying to figure out ways to encourage and empower them. Sometimes it works out well. Other times, not so well. Regardless of the outcome though, it’s always pretty fun. One of these so-called empowerment events occurred on Monday night as Ellie and I made a quick trip across the street to Sun Fresh.

Normally our trips to Sun Fresh are because I forgot to pick up something that I needed to finish dinner. On this occasion though, we were going because Ellie wanted to pick up a cake mix and some frosting for a food drive at school. Nice thought, right? Therefore, as soon as we were done eating supper, it was time to go to Sun Fresh.

I decided on this occasion that I wanted Ellie to be in charge of our shopping trip. As such, I shared that with her as soon as we walked in the door by simply saying, “You’re in charge; lead the way to the cake mixes.” With that, I settled in behind Ellie and watched as she began to lead us across the store. While I thought for certain that she would read the signs hanging above the aisles, she did not. Instead, she simply glanced down each aisle as we walked past. Finally, she found an aisle that made sense to her and turned down it.

Now, while that aisle was certainly full of sweet substances, it was not what we were looking for. Instead of being cake mixes, it was host to Oreo cookies, Potato chips, and Animal crackers, among other things. Once we established that was not the aisle we were looking for, Ellie began to head towards the frozen food section. At this point, I didn’t want her to get discouraged so I simply asked, “Are cake mixes kept cold?”. She responded with “No,” and immediately spun around and headed in the opposite direction.

Truth be told, I expected her to find the cake mixes immediately this time as we happened to be on the side of the store where we could clearly see sugar and flour as we walked. However, Ellie was not clued in to my expectations. Instead, she proceeded to wander right past the sugar and flour all the way to the dog food aisle where she began to turn in. At this point, I began to wonder if we were on a fool’s errand so I decided to give another hint.

“Honey, do you really think they keep the cake mixes next to the dog food?”
“Probably not, Dad.”
“Would you like another hint?”
“Sure, what is it?”
“Look up, what do you see?”
“Ceiling tiles.”
“No, the big green signs hanging from the ceiling tiles. What’s on those signs?”  

“Ohhhhhh.”

With that, Ellie started walking across the back of the store until she finally found a sign that listed “Cake Mixes”. We turned down the aisle, walked a bit, and lo and behold, there they were. Ellie took a few minutes to pick out the perfect chocolate cake mix and the perfect jar of vanilla icing. Then it was time to head to the checkout lane.

Just to put a punctation mark on this being Ellie’s trip to the grocery store, I handed her my credit card and told her that she was in charge of paying for our goods. This was good because it gave me an opportunity to talk with her about where money from credit cards come from and how we have to pay it back each month. Although, there was almost a minor disaster when she started loudly reading my credit card number for all to hear. No worries though as I was able to shut that down before she read too many numbers. Finally, it was our turn to check out and Ellie scanned my card to pay for our groceries. After that, she responsibly handed the card` back to me and we headed out of the store.

I enjoy small moments with lessons like this. For one thing, I’m teaching Ellie how to successfully navigate a grocery store which many people tend to have trouble with. Case in point, me every single time I have to buy maraschino cherries. Second of all, we were able to have conversations about where our money comes from and how everything has a price. Finally, it was just a fun chance to be out one-on-one with Ellie for a few minutes which is always good for a laugh or two. Good stuff, right?

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