My kids can (and do) find ways to entertain themselves when I drag them around on errands with me. I suppose it can be amusing.

Last week, having already trekked through a craft store with four of our kids in search of clear glass ornaments to decorate, we drove across town in the snow to order Richard’s Christmas gift. I was already crispy from the craft store excursion and tried mentally preparing myself not to get irritated with my kids’ boredom at Staples. After all, what’s more boring to a kid than an office supply store?

I went to the in-store kiosk to place an order and pay at the register. That’s it…no perusing the aisles, no comparing of products or prices. I had already done all that online.

A few minutes was obviously too long for them that day because my peripheral vision caught my lovelies scooting around the kiosk on the wheeled office chairs.

“Really?” I thought.

Were my 14-year-old daughter and my 12, 10 and 5-year-old sons really scooting around on these display chairs?

As a parent tries to childproof the home for a new baby who comes along after the older ones are beyond the need for childproofing…I don’t see all the opportunities for “fun” that they see until they’re in it.

I tried giving them “the look” that tells them this is unacceptable behavior, but I could only laugh. I would have loved to join them, but I didn’t. “What would people say?”

I really appreciate that aspect of childhood that fearlessly engages in harmless fun, risking rebuke by someone in charge and the resulting embarrassment.

It does, however, make me think twice before buying anything that has been a display item.

© Alexa Lopez, 2008