Precious Child

There’s nothing more precious to me than watching a child, especially Elijah, doing something they enjoy. Learning a new skill. Watching nature. Seeing something up close for the first time. Elijah is doing a lot of that lately as we stay with friends in the country.

 Living in the city doesn’t show you much of what nature has to offer. Unless you’re at a park or a zoo. Where we are staying, it is true country. We spent a while yesterday watching a squirrel eating nuts…

                                           

And then we watched a hummingbird eating out of his feeder. The pictures took a while to get since those little suckers fly a million miles an hour.

We have friends who own a horse farm and, being from the city, Elijah has never been close to a real live horse. He’s fascinated. Not only by the animals themselves but also from watching our friend jumping them over standards in shows. Here’s a few shots of him feeding a several of them apples…

                   

Apparently there is always farm stuff to do. He helped rake up the wood chips that go in the horse’s stalls. Just picked up the rake and went to work.

Even at the house we are staying at there is a lot of work to do. And he jumps right in (being the hardworking boy that he is)…

And follows along to learn the ropes…

He rode a tractor a long time ago. I think he was about 18-months-old or thereabouts. I’m sure he has no memory of it so this was pretty dang exciting…

I am so thankful to my friends for allowing him to have this experience that has been so exciting to him. And to me, especially when he asks if he can go outside and I can say “Yes, you can.”

Attention Target Team Members

Since things have gone seriously down hill at Walmart (and we all know it has), I’ve taken a lot of my shopping to Target. The store is so clean and they have some really neat merchandise. They take competitor coupons without the arguing you get at Walmart, I have my 5% off card and there’s just something about that bullseye logo.

But lately I’m thinking that Target “team members” are getting a little cocky in their confidence that they are better than Sam Walton’s group and they are letting some things are slide by. I thought I’d give them a friendly word or two of advice because, well, that’s what I do.

Make yourself visible to the guests (Gotta love it…we are not “customers”, we are “guests”.) so if we need you, we don’t have to go all over the store to find you. If you invited a person to your home (a guest), you wouldn’t disappear once this person was seated on your couch, would you? Don’t hide from us. We really aren’t scary. We just occasionally want to ask questions that only you can answer.

If you are stocking a shelf and a guest wants to peruse said shelf, move out of the way. I promise your boss isn’t going to get angry. Trust me, getting my shampoo and taking a cranky 6-year-old out of the store before he has a meltdown is way more important than having all that mousse out of the box.

Cashiers, SMILE! Be friendly. We all know it’s not an exciting job (been there, done that) but make the most of it. I know you’re tired and your feet hurt. There is not a shoe in the world or a gel insert made that feels good after standing in them eight hours every day, it’s a dead end job and the pay really sucks. But you’d be surprised how much faster your time will go or how rewarding it is if you cheer someone up.

And Associates? If someone leaves a crapload of stuff in their buggy, along with a nearly full cup of Starbucks, they definitely will be coming back for it. Especially the coffee. It’s a potty break or they need something in a different aisle. Do not under any circumstances take that cart and put their things back on the shelves. Or throw away the Starbucks. The merchandise can be replaced. But you never touch a person’s coffee.

Author’s note on this last bit: It was only left alone for ten minutes and I was in the next aisle with my boy looking at TMNT figures. You threw away my stinkin’ latté and are damn lucky I only made you dig my notebook out of the trash. I could have done worse.

And just a side note to those who take care of the courtesy phones and price checkers…they need fixed. It doesn’t matter what store I’m talking about because none of them work. Anywhere. Not that I use them much but I thought I’d let you know.

I still love Target; have done so since my first visit so long ago when I lived in Carrollton Texas. It is one of my favorite places to shop but I’m hoping that my kind ideas will take root and be accepted in the manner to which they are intended (lots of love, Target, lots of love).

Well, that’s it. I’ve given y’all a bit of my (other)worldly advice. You may return to your previously scheduled activities.