The Adventures of Batmom

The Walmart Files

Living on a budget, you shop cheap. Especially since my kids could probably out eat any one of you. My teenager is the worst! She'll peck at her food, but when you aren't looking, she's shoveling food in her mouth. She's like those ghosts on Super Mario Bros, you know when you look and they freeze, then you turn your back and they attack.

Anyway, my point is, you save money where you can. We save money by shopping at Walmart. These are just some of the very awkward things that we've encountered at Walmart.

Story 1

Back to school shopping is always a nightmare. Yes, I homeschool my kids, but I believe they should still get new clothes and stuff. My husband was going around with the younger two, while I'm going around with our oldest daughter. You'll never hate clothes shopping more until you've gone with a girl who's obsessed with clothes. Was I this bad as a teenager? My mom says I was, I think she's bluffing.

Anyway, my daughter finally had enough clothes to try on for a decade and we made our way to the dressing room. She was trying stuff on, coming out like a runway model to show me, then going back into the dressing room. After about the fifth outfit, she came out and closed the door, locking herself out, the attendant was nowhere to be seen, so my daughter decided to climb under the door. It was too late when we both realized that she had climbed under the wrong door. The woman screaming from the room and my daughter sliding out like she'd been lit on fire was too much for me. I only wished I was filming it.

Story 2

Sometimes just for a mini vacation, my husband and I will drop the kids with grandma and go to Walmart feeling like a king and queen.

One time we brought our teenager with us and she was just following us around. My husband pulled a pretty naughty yet tasteful nighty from a rack and said, "For tonight."

My teenager, who for once, didn't have her face in her phone yelled, "Ew!" And walked off mortified.

I shouldn't laugh, because I'll probably pay the therapy bills later, but it was funny.

Story 3

The store was packed, I'm sure it was some stupid holiday with all those last minute shoppers. We definitely weren't in that group. Never. In case you couldn't tell, that was sarcasm.

My kids were driving me nuts, asking for everything within eye level. The people were making me mad with their pushing and bumping. I was just beyond done as we got on the insanely long line and waited.

In front of us, there was a man with his pants practically to his ankles. I already wanted to ram my cart up his rear just because it was easy access. I refrained. Hope however, has no mouth filter. She looked up at me and tugged at my shirt. I looked down at her and waited for her to ask for everything around us. She surprised me. "Mommy, I think that man needs us to buy him a belt." I pursed my lips until my face was beet red before I cracked up laughing.

Story 4

Driving into the Walmart parking lot there's a sign to announce other stores in the shopping center. One of these stores is Office Depot.

My oldest daughter was just learning to read at this time and she was reading everything. Or attempting to anyway. She looked up at the sign and scrunched her face in concentration then said, "Offikey D Pot."

I'm literally confused, trying to figure out what she's going on about. My husband laughed, apparently seeing my confusion. "Office Depot," he then explained while my daughter is sitting in the back, proud as a peacock.

Even today, when we pass Office Depot, my husband and I will say, "Offikey D Pot" making my oldest daughter very angry and red faced.

Story 5

A few years ago, when People of Walmart was big. I still love that site though. As I was saying, when it was big, my oldest daughter had seen a few of the not so scary posts.

As we were browsing Walmart, my daughter was looking around anxiously. At first I thought maybe she was trying to find something that she wanted, but after a while, I realized that she was looking at the people. So I decided to ask her, "Faith, what are you looking for?"

She looked up at me with an almost confused expression and said, "The People of Walmart. I thought they lived here."

My husband and I both laughed and shook our heads.

Story 6

As I've stated, my kids can eat. We used to go to Sam's Club when they were younger and the only thing they took away from that was: There are people in food stores that give you free food and if you're cute, you get more than one helping.

One day we were walking through Walmart and Hope looked around in deep concentration, like she was on a mission. I finally asked her what she was looking for. She looked up at me and blinked before practically yelling, "Where's the free food people, I'm starving!"

Needless to say, we announced we were getting pizza after shopping because people were staring at us like we were horrible, kid starving people. We did get pizza!

Story 7

Our kids have always liked creepy stuff. Like when the batteries were going out in their toys, they liked the slow creepy music more than the normal music. I had nothing to do with that, but I found it hilarious. However, none of my kids like to be scared. They scare the hell out of each other all the time then scream bloody murder. My neighbors probably think we're insane.

Anyway, Halloween was around the corner and we always check out the Halloween aisles when they're set up. My son has been leery of these aisles, just because his sisters torture him. This time however, it was my turn. I grabbed one of those bowls, you know the ones that have the hand that snaps down when you reach in it? Yeah. My son had never seen one. So, me being the horrible human being I am, called my son over, "Hey Patrick, look at this cool bowl."

My, at the time, four year old son looked up at me with his blue eyes and then looked at the bowl. "Go ahead buddy, reach in," my voice was as sweet as an angel's, my husband now knows that Satan really was a beautiful angel at one time because of me.

My poor trusting son reached into the bowl, the hand snapped down and he screamed before crying so loud that I actually felt bad, even though I was laughing so hard my face hurt. I hugged him tight, but I was "bad mamma," for the rest of the day. Well, until we got ice cream anyway.

Story 8

My teenage daughter's birthday just recently passed and we were shopping beforehand. She showed us some jeans she had to have. These jeans were faded and ripped.

I looked at my husband who pretty much said what I was thinking. "WTF?"

Without missing a beat I added, "When I was young you had to earn holy jeans!"

Faith groaned and rolled her eyes, dramatically. "Mom, it's fashion."

"Faith! It's a rip off. Buy normal jeans and work for those rips!"

She stomped her foot and shriked, "You'll never understand!"

Because apparently I was never a teenager. I swear I was never this bad. My mom just sits back and laughs.