BUSY WEEK HERE but of course I’ve been to the grocery store, source of all excitement.
Once there having collected what I wanted to buy, I found myself standing in the checkout lane with a family of four, soon to be five, directly in front of me.
Mom was holding the coupons while Dad and 2 boys, ages 5 & 7, were putting the groceries on the moving conveyor belt so that the cashier could ring up the items.
AS THEY DID THIS Dad occasionally pointed out to the boys that something was on sale, or that Mom had a coupon for this particular item.
He was, I believe, trying to instill a sense of frugality in his sons.
When all the items had been rung up the total was over $200.00. Mom handed the coupons to the cashier then she went to sit down on a nearby chair.
This left Dad to pay for the groceries while the boys watched him. Again, I do believe, that his intention was that this be another learning experience in money management.
ALL THREE MALES stared at the computer screen as the cashier swiped each coupon into the scanner. The screen showed coupon savings while simultaneously the computer made a bell-like ringing-dinging sound with each subtraction from the total.
Apparently this sound reminded the boys of a video game adding up points. The sound was so reminiscent of a game that the older boy, thoroughly impressed with his father’s game skillz, said:
“Wow, Dad. You did great. You got a really high score.”
~ ~ 😆 ~ ~
Thanks for this. It gave me a good laugh this morning. I can just picture the kid saying that.
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Michele, it was a small moment in time that made my day. That kid was soooo proud of his Dad.
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I can just imaging. It’s moments like these that make you smile.
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Yes, I agree. After the family rolled out of the store, the cashier and I had a good laugh.
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A nice story. Hope the learning sticks with them.
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Z-D, I don’t know what those boys were learning from this experience, but they were attentive and cute. 🤔
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And all I can think of is the kind of post most people who were behind someone buying $200 worth of groceries and using an entire Sunday paper’s worth of coupons would write about this experience. Let’s just say that you are a potent portal of positivity and the patron saint of patience!
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evilsquirrel13, thank you. When I stumble upon free entertainment I pay attention. And this family was a hoot and a half, as they say.
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Hehehe! I love listening to little kids trying to relate to the mysteries of the adult world.
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Deb, that’s exactly what was going one here. Dad was patiently trying to explain monetary things, however I’m not sure that’s the message these boys got. 😃
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Love it! We should all make saving money a game…
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Oh Rivergirl, in my family growing up every shopping experience was the saving money game. I’m a pro.
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you always have the best grocery store stories. if only the amount saved was the bigger number.
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teacherturnedmommy, thank you. There’s something about the people who shop in our local Kroger stores that I find entertaining. I agree that saving $200.00 would have been spectacular, but *alas* that didn’t happen.
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that would be extreme couponing!
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Great!
I’m sure the boys were also learning that grocery shopping is NOT just for moms/women, either. To me, that was the best lesson of all.
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nance, I hadn’t thought of that, but you’re right. This dad was into the task and the boys were watching everything that was going on. Good point.
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Sounds like Dad has latched on to some creative lifeskills coaching. Whatever works, right?
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Maggie, yes I agree. Dad was working that pay attention to the money you spend angle while the boys were… I dunno… learning something.
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My son was once an extreme couponer. It was amazing, but took a lot of time and effort. Wow, though, he saved so much money.
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Maggie, I like and use coupons but not like your son. I can only imagine how time-consuming it’d be. This family had it going on with their savings, but not in an extreme way. More in a funny way, actually.
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He doesn’t do it any more, but when his family was just started, he saved a lot of money. He would never have time now.
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It’s the time thing, for sure, that’d slow me down about extreme couponing. I/we use coupons but not obsessively, more like joyfully when we remember.
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I’ve come close to stopping with the coupons except for really good savings. A lot of time and work (and you have to remember to take them!) and sometimes the savings are small. I was much more into it when I was younger and bought more groceries. Oddly I taught my husband how to effectively use them. He raised 4 kids by himself without coupons. I don’t know how you do that.
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Kate, you make good points in that you have to remember to take the coupons with you to the store and it’s work to use them. 4 kids and no coupons? However could that happen? 😳
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So cute! You never know what’s going to come out of a child’s mouth.
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Jean R, no you don’t. Nor can you assume they’re learning the lesson you’re trying to teach them! 🙄
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I’m always so happy when I see parents taking the time to teach their children life lessons. So many opportunities are lost. This is a great story (and I agree with nance that it’s good for the boys to see shopping as a gender-neutral activity). But, you forgot one thing… what was the final total?
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Janis, I agree with you. I like seeing parents tuning into their kids, teaching them something good by their parental actions. And this Dad was great.
I didn’t see [or hear] the final total because I couldn’t see the screen from where I was standing. I only know the $200.00 amount b/c Dad said it out loud to the boys right before the cashier started scanning the coupons.
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Those moments! Such fun to be had by observation. Lovely Ally Bean, thanks!
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Susan, exactly. I wasn’t being nosy, I was just standing there observing. And this family was delightfully smart and funny.
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Ally, that tale made me chuckle too 😀
I have new grocery stores to test out following the move. The staff in the most local are extraordinary friendly, although *all* of the wine, meat and fish have anti-theft tags on them, so I’ve no idea what that’s telling me!
My previous primary grocery store was well-known for the regular wearing of fluffy slippers, occasionally combined with actual bathrobes :O I’m currently trying to work out if this is some kind of improvement.
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Deb, anti-theft tags on the meat? That’s a new one on me. I’ve seen wine tagged, but actual food– never. I look forward to learning more about your new lifestyle as you discover it. So you’re all settled into your new house now?
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Ally, I was agog.
We’re pretty settled now thanks. Just pictures to put on walls and we’re there. This could be an interesting experience as Himself moved in to live with me after I’d hung pictures. He’s a minimalist, I’m a maximilist. I compromise, he tries to smile 🙂
I’ll have to get him to do the quiz in your last post. It was spot on for me too (Naturalist).
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I can see where you two will have your challenges regarding how to decorate your home. No advice here, but sending you positive thoughts and good wishes.
You’re another Naturalist. So far that’s been THE personality type among those people who follow this blog. Go figure.
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I’m vacationing Ally Bean and while waiting in the checkout at the highly overpriced island grocery the clearly stressed clerk had no problem telling everyone loudly that she was having a REALLY hard day and was counting the moments until she could sit with multitudes of alcohol and relax. I don’t often hear that at home 😄
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Deb, that’s funny and soooo honest. I’m sure I’d not hear that at my home Kroger store, but on an island… maybe yes. Hope you’re having a good time wherever you might be. 😎
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Lopez Island, San Juans- off Washington coast. Gorgeous, but no idea how anyone affords to live here!
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Then it’s a good place to visit! 😉
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Great story, so cute. I’m trying to stay out of grocery stores these days but of course I have to eat, so that’s impossible. I guess I could have my groceries delivered but I’m not a shut-in and I like to pick my own produce 🙂 My husband and I go to the store super early to avoid crowds, like at 6:30 AM, and even then the music is blasting and the singer is screaming the lyrics. At 6:30 AM in the morning? Yes. Why can’t the modern world learn to live without screeching music everywhere? This is the conundrum I’m trying to unravel.
All the best to you
Susan Grace
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Susan, I wouldn’t like shopping with that much noise going on. I can see why you shop at the hour you do, but I don’t understand why there’d be loud music then.
You make a good point about music everywhere– and may I add, there are TV screens everywhere, too. They bug me, flashing ads at me, showing me images I don’t want to see. Calm and serene is good. Preferable even. 🤨
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I don’t like TV screens everywhere, either. Grrrr. I only try to stay out of stores because of all the loud music everywhere; otherwise, I love supporting small businesses, etc, and feel bad that many stores are closing because everyone is online.
I love your take on life!
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I know what you mean. I’d prefer to shop at smaller stores, but they are few and far between anymore. Of course I shop online so I’m partly to blame. 🙄
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It’s hard to NOT shop online. Especially at Christmas when it’s important for my sanity that I stay far from crowds and madness!
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Yes, I don’t like crowds of people either. And especially when the energy is frantic. Like at Christmastime. We all do what we can to stay sane, don’t we?
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About the final total: I’d think if you heard alot of dings for a longish time that would translate to great savings…big reduction on the final total.
Just sayin’…
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laura, I hope they got a lot of savings because the system did make a lot of noise. The final total shall remain a mystery for all time. 😐
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I love how kids view the world with their unique perspective. My younger daughter was wont to blurt out embarrassing stuff at the store, many times comments on people’s size or appearance. It was embarrassing!
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Margaret, yes kids have their own ways of interpreting things. Despite what the parents are trying to do. Kind of funny to watch from afar, probably less funny when you’re the parent in the moment.
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Nice family. It’s hard these days, to find a family that shops together and doesn’t end up in a melt down.
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dawn, I hadn’t thought of that but you’ve got a point. There was no anger in this family, just lots of focus on numbers. And what they meant, which is to say different things to different people. 🙄
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Thank you for the morning smile. I can picture the whole scene quite clearly!
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Donna, it was funny and sweet to watch. Dads are predictable, but kids can be a hoot.
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Very cute story! Nice that there was a spot for mom to sit down. We don’t have any chairs near our checkout counters. I used to coupon all the time but now I just go online and add the coupons for the things I buy routinely and they are loaded on my Safeway card. So much easier.
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Janet, I think there might be something similar with Kroger and its loyalty card, but I still like and use the paper coupons. Yes, I’m a Luddite, proudly clutching my little pieces of paper as I shop the store so I got what this family was up to.
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It’s amazing how some people can save so much money with coupons. We never quite got the hang of it, unfortunately…
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John, we use coupons and some days are able to save big, but most of the time it’s just a small amount that we save. Still… money saved is money earned.
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I love the story, but I have to admit I loved more your inclusion of the Idaho spuds gif. It goes great with the grocery store anecdote and it cracked me up. – Marty
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Marty, I had to zhoosh up this post somehow, and what better way than to add a spud? 😋
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Ah, the lessons we learn in the grocery stores. I find it extremely irritating that the healthier we try to eat the higher my video game checkout score is. Sheesh.
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Laura, I agree. Healthy = expensive, but it’s great that you can play the video checkout game so well. I’m sure the little boy I overheard would be impressed with your score, too.
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Cute!
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Jan, it really was. Fun thing to overhear.
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Saving at the grocery store is my favorite “video game” . . . I always aim for a big SCORE!
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nancy, me too! Some days I win, other days I don’t. But regardless I do try.
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Sometimes, the lesson plan doesn’t work.
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Dan, well said. That’s exactly what was going on and it was funny.
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That was cute…..and great that the parents were trying to instill money skills at such a young age, even if they did interpret it as part of a video game! I believe they are now about to make money management and budgeting part of a high school life skills class now here, which is long overdue.
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Joni, this Dad was quietly, calmly just mentioning the price of things, how they’d save money. A casual teaching moment. The boys were listening, but not getting the intended point of things. Money management needs to be in a life skills class. Smart that your high school has caught onto that.
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Awwww.
I love grocery games! Abram and I play who can get closest to the total.
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katie, that’s a great grocery store game and a good way to get a kid interested in money or numbers. So who wins most often?
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This year it’s become a pretty even split!! He’s getting better and better and I’m getting worse as we age. 😉
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Seems like you’re teaching him a life skill with this game. I’m sure you can take the losing in stride.
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Totally cute!!
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That’s fantastic! I loved that — great observation!
Makes me grateful to sorta be down to two kids after having four. And ooh, girl, there was that one summer my eldest daughter had to take steroids, and lawd did she EAT. Ooh.
I will now complain about how high my grocery bill has been all summer, and how there are rarely any leftovers for The Mister’s lunch, which in turn means he eats less wonderful food in the cafe at work, spending even more money. But we let that boy save, and that’s good. Two more weeks, Ally Bean, two more weeks.
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joey, ok I’m laughing here. You’re good folks to let the boy save. No doubt you’ll get back to your 2-child normal soon enough, although as I remember teen girls can chow down with the best of them. Or at least my friends and I could. Still, leftovers for your husband’s lunch is a [lofty?] doable goal. And won’t it be lovely to not win big on your grocery bill when the video game adds it up!
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I love your observations of ordinary things that are so amusing.
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Anne, thanks. That’s what this was. Just a little moment that made me smile while it happened, laugh with the cashier after the family left.
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Thanks for this little snapshot – you described it so well I almost felt
Like I was there for a second
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Yvette, it was quietly funny and that’s my kind of humor. Oh the irony of Dad trying so hard to teach these boys about money…
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And also another example of how much can be gleaned when we take the time to observe and pay attention /
—
We briefly met the family of this nurse we know – they are all from Kenya and one of the guys said that people in the US and Britain are all “busy busy”
And I know wha he meant –
And at times I feel that “busy busy” hustle
And your post was opposite
It was prego mom sitting down on this family time to the store with our author not being busy busy so she could pay attention and give us this vignette
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Kind words, thank you. And I agree that many people are too “busy busy” all. the. time. Seems to me that they’re missing out on the good stuff in life.
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Haha, Kids sometimes don’t quite get the intention of their parents:):) Priceless!
Thank you for your comment about the teal and yellow:)
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Junieper2, this little conversation made me smile. I get what Dad was trying to do and I get why the kids thought what they did. If you’re going to wait in line at the grocery, might as well get a story out of it!
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What a great story Ally! And I’m so glad the family got a good score!
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Dorothy, I’m glad they got a good score and that I got a good laugh out of it.
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Mom and I used to compete over who could rack up the highest “score” (discount) at the grocery. I still brag about anything over 20%.
Teaching frugality, the dangers of: When #4 Daughter was wee, she would ride in the seat part of the cart while I did the shopping. On one trip, I began hearing thumps and mutters from behind me while I looked at the shelves. I turned around to find her jettisoning items from my cart, saying, “Too ‘spensive. Too ‘spensive.”
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marian, I’m laughing out loud here. That’s a wonderful story of… I dunno… overlearning? Clearly you made your point with #4 Daughter. 😊
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Oh, I love it! It reminds me of my son and myself.
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Lacey, how funny! Sometimes kids get the message you intend them to receive, but other times… 🤷♀️
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Hilarious. You must have smiled.
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philmouse, I did smile. I wasn’t trying to eavesdrop but the conversation was loud and right there in front of me. Free entertainment.
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And you thought you were just there for groceries
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😊
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Haha. Cute. This sounds like a story I’d have on my blog, except, of course, there would be Chex Mix. 😉 Any idea what the savings were? $200 is a lot in groceries. I hope the coupons added up to more than, like, $2.
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Betsy, I don’t know how much they saved. From where I was standing I couldn’t see the screen. I only know the beginning amount because Dad said it out loud to the boys right before the cashier started scanning the coupons.
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Gotcha.
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Adorable story! Kids’ perspectives are always the funniest. Mona
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Mona, I agree. Kids make me laugh with what they pick up on, despite what we adults try to teach them.
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Oh that’s hilarious!
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Jo, I thought it was, too. 😉
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It sounds like this grocery visit required a great deal of patience…………from you, Ally:) Overall it sounds like it was a positive experience:)
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Erica/Erika, once I saw what was going on with this family I was more curious than impatient. Gotta take your humor where you find it!
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Ha ha – so much for instilling the importance of being on an austerity kick. The whole concept just zoomed right over their heads.
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linda, yes the frugality concept was beyond those boys, but they knew numbers on a screen. They were cute.
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Ally – I once wrote a post mentioning the “horsey ride” at the grocery store. I can remember going many years ago when my parents did the grocery shopping. Our Meijer grocery store has a horse ride for one penny and though the modern generation of kids is so different from when I sat on one of those horses, the delight is exactly the same. Our store has the theme from “Bonanza” while the ride is going on. It makes me smile whenever I watch those kids. One of the U-scan clerks has a pocketful of pennies and if a kid wants to ride and the parents have no spare change, she’ll deposit the penny and help them get on the horse and watch them while the parents pack their own groceries … (something different with that picture too when you think about it).
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I’d forgotten about those horsey rides. Loved them, when I could get my mom to slow down and let me ride one. I agree that there’s something different about the current Meijer scenario you describe. Shouldn’t the parents be with the kid while the employee packs the bag?
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Exactly! I’m amazed every time I watch this scenario play out.
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LOL – the things you see at a grocery store become magical words for you to use in a post. You never cease to inspire me, Ally!
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Shelley, thank you. I tell ‘ya I don’t go looking for stories, they seem to find me. And then, of course, I have to write about them here!
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You’re very observant. Absolutely, those moments are nuggets worthy of telling about! 🙂
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Very cute! I like seeing the numbers go down at the grocery store. I don’t clip coupons, as they are usually for things I don’t buy anyway, but I do belong to a few grocery clubs where they are automatic when you put in your phone number.
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J, I suspect most adults would like to see the numbers go down when checking out of the grocery. We have that phone number thing going on here, too. Any way you can save is a good one.
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Those boys were cute! What’s funny is that the mom was probably the one who collected all of those coupons so the boy could tell their dad what he had done. 😉
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L. Marie, I bet you’re right about that. Mom had done her bit, now it was Dad’s turn to shine.
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So stinkin’ cute. I love that age–so full of positivity, magic, and imagination. I love that the parents set such a valuable example, too. Rare to see.
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Kate, I agree. These parents were doing what I think is a good thing by quietly demonstrating frugality as no big deal– but important. When this kid came out with what he said however, I could barely keep from laughing out loud.
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