Shop til You Drop

I took Tobias shopping today. He had money burning a hole in his pocket, so we hit the outlet mall in Marysville. He wasn’t disappointed. He knows all the name brands and how much everything costs in Norway, so he was pleased to buy his Adidas shoes for $24, Levi Jeans for $27 and two DK shirts for $10 each. He just kept shaking his head and saying, “It’s just so cheap…”. He would have paid more in Norway just to buy one t-shirt than he spent in total today. I kept telling him, it’s not that America is so cheap, it’s that Norway is expensive. Maybe he understands, maybe he doesn’t. He really wanted a Tommy Hilfiger windbreaker but it didn’t fit as perfectly as he would like. He’s a discriminating shopper, and I appreciate that. He’s also very frugal and didn’t want to spend more than he had to.




We stopped at Wal-Mart afterwards so I could get a few things and we happened to walk by the sporting goods section. His eyes nearly popped out of his head when he saw a BB gun on the shelf, ready for the taking. He couldn’t believe people could buy such a thing without having to get permission first. I told him it was just a BB gun, but in Norway, it’s a highly controlled item, I guess. He also nearly choked when he saw it was only twenty bucks and as much as I tried to talk him into buying it, he just wouldn’t do it. He was worried his mom wouldn’t be happy with him if he did, and he wasn’t sure he wanted to spend that much money on it, even though it was so cheap. He knew he couldn’t bring it into Norway, so it would have to qualify as “entertainment” money well spent. I couldn’t stand his anguish, so I just bought it.



When I got home, Kory’s eyes popped out of his head when he saw the gun. He’s been wanting to get Kaleb a BB gun forever, but I wouldn’t allow it. I’m not a fan of fire arms of any kind, but Kaleb’s been to many events where he’s been able to do some target shooting and he likes it and he’s good. I relented and bought it myself, so it doesn’t belong to Kaleb or Tobias and I have control over who uses it. It was the best scenario I could think of, and it’s working out okay. Tobias loved hitting the targets we set up and when Kaleb finally finished all the hissy fits he threw today, he was out there too, shooting pop cans off the fence post, just like I used to do when I was a kid.



We are all still getting over jet lag and Kaleb has the sniffles on top of that, so he’s not been in top form. Today Kory fixed something on the zip line and he asked Kaleb to try it out. Kaleb ended up doing a body slam into the nearest tree, so then he was really a mess, crying for hours about how sore he was and how much pain he was in. I think he was over reacting because of his other conditions, (he didn’t have a bruise on him) but he was most unpleasant to be around this afternoon. I felt badly for Tobias having to watch Kaleb pitch so many fits. Tobias even shook his head and said he’s never seen a kid act so disrespectfully in his life. Lucky me.



I made Tobias pick up the piles of weeds I left in the yard today, as his chore for the day. When I asked him to do it, he hopped right up and completed the task almost before the request was out of my mouth. I pointed out to Kaleb that I liked that kind of immediate obedience, and Kaleb responded with, “It’s the laws of nature; a kid will always obey someone who is not their parent more than they obey their parent.” Where does he come up with this stuff?