Gumball Gorging

I've been a single mother this week.

It stinks.

My respect for real single mothers grows exponentially every time my husband is gone on business a mere few days. Six to be exact, but whose counting? Fall is a very busy time for him at work.

And so, on "Dad's Coming Home Tomorrow Eve", I took the girls to their favorite place to celebrate that we'd all made it. Alive and

somewhat sane.

This is where we wound up:

Sweet CeCe's. The world's greatest self-serve yogurt place. Although tonight's visit was relatively uneventful, I will take this opportunity to tell you about the LAST time we were patrons in this lovely little shop.

Someone, who will remain unnamed,

was taking great issue at the tyrannical rules of my kingdom. Specifically, my unjust requirement that all my loyal subjects must wear shoes into public places of business.

To make her protests known, she staged a standoff on the sidewalk outside the store. One of us was going to win this. It was NOT going to be the 3-yr-old. After asking nicely, being firm and using my "mean" voice, trying to make a joke of it, and actually putting the shoes on her four times (and her kicking them off every time), I had to be ruthless.

I picked her up and our little party walked into the store, where I helped her sisters choose their yogurt and begin looking at topping choices.

That was too much for her. She couldn't hold out any longer. She begged me to let her put her shoes on so she could have ice cream like her sisters.

"Oh, well, I guess if you really want to put your shoes on I'll let you. Are you sure?"

Not wanting to lose my momentum, I gave quick instructions for her big sisters to wait for us with their yogurt and we'd be right back.

We promptly made our way outside, where she calmly and agreeably retrieved her shoes off the sidewalk and put them on her sweet little feet.

We walked back inside, hand in hand, happy with the world, and this is what I found:

This is a warning for parents and caregivers everywhere: in less than 8.2 seconds, your children can rack up a significant bill at Sweet CeCe's. I had left 2 girls with cups of soft serve ice cream in a room that looked like THIS:

What the heck was I thinking?

I mean, look at this!! It's like a wonderland of delight!! Every type of candy you can imagine and all you have to do is turn this beautiful little wheel to get as much as you want! It's so colorful! It's so...EVERYTHING!

Both girls had proceeded to completely fill their yogurt cups with beautiful, brightly colored gum balls.

Gumballs. The heaviest candy on the planet. Which usually would not matter, really, except when you're paying for their treat by the OUNCE.

What was I to do? I couldn't exactly put them back. I chalked it up to parental error (because I had never actually said the words, 'please do not fill your giant yogurt cups to the brim with heavy candy while I'm gone') and walked us all to the cashier.

It's a little like when you get your water bill after forgetting to turn off the hose after washing the car. Um, for a whole day you forget. Oops. But who would do THAT?

Child #1 placed her yogurt delight on the scale....almost $10.

Child #2 was next...almost $6.

Child #3, who had missed out on the topping free for all, came away for a mere $3.

Alright, girls, you're eating mommy's special Starbucks treat for the next three weeks, but really, enjoy it. It's fine.

A few bites in, I am informed that child #1 and child #2 do not like their yogurt.

WHAT?!

I can't say that I blame them, however. I mean, who WOULD like frozen balls of gum in their yogurt? You can't eat it, you can't chew it because it's frozen solid from the yogurt, and the colors are all bleeding onto your lovely cream-colored yogurt, making it a weird kind of brown color.

I would say Sweet CeCe's won that round. But mark my words, Cece, THIS Mom won't be making that mistake again. I could almost hear you laughing as you lulled my naive babies towards the wheel to the gum balls. Evil. Mean. A business owner who probably has her own children she must somehow make enough money to pay their bills.

So beware, yogurt lovers...self-serve could mean self-destruct to your wallet.