target: dream or nightmare

I'm not sure if Target is every Baby Buncher's dream or nightmare. When we lived overseas, where NOTHING like Target existed, I often longed dreamed for a place I could go to get everything--food, clothes, baby items, hardware, towels, etc. And while in each place we lived we had some "equivalent to Walmart" nothing was EVER the equivalent to Target. So I bopped around from place to place doing what every other Baby Buncher did pre-Target and went to a million places for all my goods. It sucked.

But in the almost three years since we've been back in this country, I have spent more of our money at Target than anywhere else. Seriously. I really should get some kind of kick back. But since Target is across from the gym and all my friends are also at the gym (where else can we dump our kids guilt free for two hours), Target is also a place to grab a post-workout coffee and casually "run" into friends in the organizing section.

So how could Target be bad if I can get everything there AND entertain my kids? Well, back in the day during that brief time when both my kids would sit happily in the cart and eat Goldfish, Target WAS the perfect place. Actually, I seriously considered it an outing. Mommy gets errands done + coffee. Kids get a snack and maybe even a $1 toy.

But this time period was only a brief one. The problem is Target itself. It's a distraction. I went in yesterday with my husband and kids to get ONE thing. I found myself wandering and lured away from my main goal by their seductive displays. My husband actually had to physically pull me back to the cart and tell me to focus on the task.

Lately I have noticed, since my kids' tolerance of doing ANY errand has actually increased, their tolerance of Target has proportionally decreased. Why? Because I think I have pushed them too far in this Mecca for moms. In the beginning the goal was about getting in and out of a place alive and with kids not screaming their heads off. Now that I know they don't this--instead they run like animals through the racks--I have expected too much of them beyond their knowledge of going in to pick up a few things.

So the lesson learned is now that my kids actually know what Target means: hours of endless of wandering for crap we don't need (even with the probability of a chocolate milk) this outing beyond just an errand doesn't meet their needs any longer, and they can't tolerate more than 10-20 minutes of it. Smart kids.

As a side note, I have heard my kids praise Target. Like when I told them we needed to get new shoes. My daughter's response was: Why aren't we going to Target. They have everything!

Or when I found my kids actually "playing Target" the other day. The game is ride up to the imaginary window on your bike and ask for shoes, clothes, toys, cards, movies, books, shampoo, food, sheets, towels. Target suddenly became drive-thru in their world.

Ahhhhhhh . . . and wouldn't that be a perfect world.

Comments

[Emily]

Too funny! I'm one of those rare people that actually hates target (I actually might be the only one!) and I totally feel that it has contributed to the recession by encouraging impulse buys and over spending. I used to only go for diapers. Once I discovered diapers.com, I stopped going to Target all today and surprisingly (or maybe not so surprisingly) our household spending in that category has gone down. It's been over 2 months since I've set foot in a Target and I don't miss it at all!

[Sue]

Very interesting post. I'm still in the Target = Errands w/Kids Survival stage and kind of force it into a "one stop shop" just to save my sanity and avoid meltdowns. That "buy it all here" habit may be tough to break down the line!!!! My kids must think everything comes from Target too, because once at a birthday party my daughter was showing a group of guests her Stride Rite sandals. She pointed to them and proudly announced, "My mommy got me these at Target!"