Tuesday, September 18, 2012

That Time I Went Grocery Shopping For the First Time After Getting Married

When Eric and I were eating dinner last night, we were talking about how often we ate out when we first got married and how strange it was for me to spend money on going out to eat because my family rarely ate out growing up. Then he brought up the first time I went grocery shopping for the first time after we got married. It gave both of us a good laugh and I thought, heck- why not put it on the blog so that when we get older we can remember/share with our children funny experiences we had in the early years of our marriage. So without further ado, my grocery shopping story:

We had gotten home from our honeymoon and were settling into real life in our adorable little townhouse in Scottsdale as a newly married couple when we realized our cupboards were bare. Eric asked if I could go grocery shopping after work on Monday, and like a good little wifey, I happily obliged. I asked him if there was anything specific he would like me to get, and he said to just get whatever I wanted. Perhaps he meant, or what he should have said, is to get what I thought we needed for meals for the week.

Now, in order to fully appreciate my story, I must provide a little back story. Although I had moved out of my parents house after high school, and had lived on my own (well mostly on my own) I still had never gone "big grocery shopping," as we called it growing up, by myself. I usually would only pick up a few items at a time that I needed. Basically, "big grocery shopping" meant mom was going to wal-mart an hour away (oh the joy of small towns) to buy tons of groceries to last the next few weeks and we'd end up spending like 3 hours in wal-mart, during most of which we tried to convince her of things we should get. Things that we really, realllllly wanted. Most of those items included completely unhealthy, sugar infused, extremely delicious snacks. She, of course, always said no and would occasionally let us get one, less than $1, candy or candy bar at the check out stand. My sisters and I tired to get smart and one of us would distract my mom, while the other would place a yummy, non-mom-approved, snack into the cart and hope she would not notice. We actually got away with it a few times, but mostly, she found our hidden treasures when she started stacking all of the items on the sliding grocery belt. Okay, now fast forward back to Monday after work.

With no list in hand, I made my way into the grocery store after work and grabbed a cart, wondering what I should get. (You know what's coming, don't you?) I racked my brain, trying to remember the meals I knew how to make and trying to recall what the ingredients were. Just like I remembered my mom doing, I started at one end of the store down one isle and then weaved up and down the isles until I ended up on the opposite side of the store. After a couple of hours of pining over what to get, I realized I had successfully filled up my cart and proceeded to check out, with a big smile on my face.  I remember thinking, "Gosh, grocery shopping is so expensive!" It was so fun to be able to grocery shop for my own household, our little family of two. I loaded my brown plastic bags into the trunk of my car and headed home. I called Eric to let him know I was on my way, and to be ready to help me carry the groceries in. He asked how much I spent and I told him the amount... which was like $200 or something, and he asked if I got a lot of food for that amount (you see, he had never really "big grocery shopped" either, although I'm not sure how it was done in his household) and I told him I got tons! He could tell I was very excited and he met me outside when I pulled up to help me carry in my large load.

After all the bags were brought in, I started unloading the goods. And I do mean goods! As Eric helped me put the groceries away, he kept looking through the bags as if he was looking for something. When I asked him what was wrong, he said, "Where's all of the food?" As I looked around at what I had purchased, I had realized my little kid self inside me took over as a grocery shopped! I had come home with $200 worth of delicious snacks, and no actual food to eat! I guess I got overly excited about being able to get what I wanted, that I forgot that I would actually need to have meals to eat. The only thing I could think to say was, "You said to get whatever I wanted." My poor husband! He couldn't help but laugh because of how excited I was when he talked to me on the phone and then how sad my face looked when I realized I had ultimately failed at my first grocery shopping trip.

We ended up going back to the store the next day, together, (okay, it's obvious I needed some supervision!) and bought another $100 or so worth of groceries to make actual meals.
Oh common, who needs breakfast, lunch, and dinner anyway? :)

By the way- I realized I liked grocery shopping with Eric rather than alone so I came up with "the grocery game" to convince him to come with me. If you have a husband that doesn't particularly like going grocery shopping with you, perhaps my game will work for you! Let me know if you want the rules to the game!* ;)

Want another laugh? The next time I went grocery shopping, I ended up getting a few packages of paper plates and plastic cups because both Eric and I hated doing dishes. I may as well have taken up stock because that lasted a good 6 months! The only time we busted out my adorable dish set that my mother-in-law got us, was when someone else came over to eat. I can admit when I'm lazy, and that was such a lazy thing to do, but hey, it made us happy and made for a clean kitchen!

For those who may be concerned for my husband's well-being, I assure you that I am a very competent, list-making, occasional-coupon-using grocery shopper now, I do know how to cook a meal or two, and both Eric and I know how to and do actually clean the dishes. ;)

*Update:
The Grocery Game:

Rule 1: You both have to be present to win.
Rule 2: No adding along the way with a calculator, only secretly in your head.
Rule 3: You must make your guess prior to the first item being scanned. (On your way to the check-out stand works great.)

Objective: Be the one to estimate the closest cost of the grocery bill.

Prize: The one who gets closest to the actual bill (can be over or under), gets one SEXUAL favor of their choice (translate that however you wish;) ), redeemable within 24 hours. :)

6 comments:

  1. I wish to hear the rules of the grocery store game! I am sure Ben would appriciate it! :)

    ReplyDelete
  2. You two are too cute! I love shopping and coming up with my next culinary adventure as the bf likes to call it since that's what I do in the kitchen. :D I'm glad you've finally got it down but that's a story to remember!

    ReplyDelete
  3. This is hilarious! I love it, the joys of being newlyweds.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Seriously, this is such a cute story! I would also love to hear the rules of this grocery store game!!

    ReplyDelete
  5. I suppose I should have just put the explanation of the grocery game in the post. I didn't mean to have one of those stupid, leave you hanging, just begging to get a comment, posts- I just wasn't sure if it was appropriate to post, it is PG-13 and all.

    Well I'm just going to go up and add it in there for kicks and giggles. :)

    ReplyDelete