Breyla.com Parenting Tip #1:
Making grocery shopping with your children fun and productive:

O.K. so it’s that time of the week again when your normally well behaved children go crazy with complaining as you utter the words “time for a trip to the grocery store.”
After getting your children all strapped in the car or your littlest ones buckled into the stroller for a walk to the local grocery store your mind wonders into a daydream about a grocery store trip that will only take three minutes total – with every store item needed leaping from the shelf into your cart not to mention the checkout lane that automatically scans and bags in a split second. Woken from your daydream by voices saying - ‘can I get that?’, ‘can I get this?’ - you realize that you have arrived in aisle one with no magic genie in sight.

Tip:

Before leaving for the grocery store create for each child age two and up their own grocery store list. Depending on how much time you have you may choose to cut and paste a list using that week’s grocery store flier (this type of picture plus word list works great for children who are not yet readers or who are just learning to read.) Have the children choose items for their own list or choose items for them that they would like or use (example: Sean likes apples, carrots, bread and cheese. She uses paper plates and bendy straws. Aaron likes ice cream, salsa, blueberries and bananas. He uses tissues, toilet paper and zip-lock bags.) Read over the lists with the children before entering the store - before leaving the house, in the store parking lot or during your walk to the store will work well. Right before entering the store hand each child their own  cloth grocery shopping bagto place the items from their own shopping list into. Before entering each aisle read the aisle number and the item categories found in that aisle. If you are with children that can read have them read the categories to the family out loud. Knowing what to expect in each aisle will help the children look out for an item that they might find from their list to be placed in their own cloth grocery shopping bag. With children that are old enough to go through the store on their own or be an aisle ahead or an aisle behind you a scavenger hunt shopping trip is also a great idea. Have the older children take 10 items each from your master plan shopping list along with a cloth grocery shopping bag and see who finishes gathering their items first or who saves the most at check out time with coupons and sales. As you and your children work together to accomplish a main goal co-operation skills, communication and on a good day bargain finding skills are developed.

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How did this tip work for your family grocery shopping trip?
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