We Made It! — A Farm Wife

After raising 4 sons and finally having 2 granddaughters I felt deserving to have some shopping time with them. Girl shopping is more fun than boy shopping.

13 years ago, the two grandgirls and I went shopping in August before school. I wanted to shop with and buy an outfit for them. We had lunch at McDonald’s before heading home.

Thus started a 13-year tradition that has been a highlight of my years ever since. The one outfit progressed into dollar amounts for their choice of purchases.

Last year, their junior year in high school we decided that this year, their senior year, needed to be special. We wanted to go somewhere over night. We nixed Chicago because we’re not too fond of big cities. We thought about Mall of America but that would be an eight-hour drive.

I decided to keep our destination a secret. I searched large malls in our surrounding states and landed on South Park Mall near Cleveland, Ohio. When I first searched the distance, I thought it said four hours. Perfect I thought. Well, it ended up being five.

Then my brain went into “how can I make this more special?” mode.

I took the amount of money I was going to give them and had several different denominations. I rolled them up, placed the largest bills in the middle and put them in tissue paper, kind of like a bouquet. My plan was to give it to them when we started and they would have to unroll, straighten, and count.

As the time approached, I tried to come up with other things to do.

Wa la! Pictures! I had pictures captured every year. I printed them off individually, mixed them up and put them in an envelope. They each had a set and their job was to put them in order and identify where we were at the time.

Both activities were a success.

Of course, there was a candy stash. As a bonus, Grandpa came along as our chauffer and traveling companion. He did a good job of holding down the couches at the mall and chatting with other shoppers.

We got our steps in even with 5 hours in the car.