Bad Parenting

We are all guilty of it, from time to time.

I just have to put that out there, from the get-go, so you don't think I am an absolute hypocrite for criticizing others.  I don't claim to be "all that and a bag of chips", so to speak.  I know I've dropped the ball on more than one occasion.

Still, an example of Bad Parenting happened right in front of me the other day, and I felt like commenting on it.

I was standing in the checkout line at our local big box membership style warehouse store when I noticed a domestic struggle happening in the next line over.  Toddler Girl sitting in the cart was throwing a minor hissy fit because Mommy was attempting to wrestle a pink activity book out of her hands.  Mommy said, "We have to pay for it..." and succeeded in separating the book from Toddler Girl, who settled back, content with Mommy's reasoning.

Then Mommy surreptitiously slipped the book behind her back to her teen aged son...

...who returned it to the place in the store they took it from in the first place!

So, they took a book off the shelf and used it to entertain a 2 year old throughout the entire store with absolutely NO intention of actually buying it.  And lied to her to get it back.

Who does that?!?

Probably the same people who open up un-purchased items in their cart and let their kids snack on them while shopping, then pay for the mostly empty carton with the rest of the groceries.  When I see that, I am reminded of the time I accidentally left my wallet out of my purse one day and had to walk away from a cart full of groceries (extremely embarrassed, of course!).  What if this parent with the opened and consumed products gets to the register and realizes they can't pay, after all?

What kind of messages are these parents sending their kids?

I am a liar.  I only said that to get it away from you.

I don't have to pay for it in order to use it.



Like I said at the front end of this post.  My parenting probably cannot stand up to much scrutiny on any given day.  But I hope that the mistakes I make are not the kind that send rotten messages to my kids.