Shopping!

Used to be such a joyful experience.  Now I get a thrill out of walking around Tesco's on my own, like I used to once upon a time when I bought clothes. Those days are gone my friends.  As many of you can vouch for, shopping now means undertaking military precision planning with decoys planted in every pocket and snacks stashed for each till visited.

My pitiful attempt last weekend, which ran foul of nap time and thus was ear piercingly cut short denying the most major items on my list, got me thinking of where I'd recommend to any of my new-parent friends.  So here's my summary of the major shopping malls/shops in West of Scotland....

For me, the best option now is Braehead Shopping Centre, between Paisley and Glasgow off the M8.  It's nothing exciting, but then I would say that about most malls!  I spent many fun filled spontaneous child free years avoiding the repetition of shopping malls.  They are however a god send to parents & babysitting grandparents alike.  Apart from the obvious fact that the weather is one less thing to have to plan for, they do house most of the places that we need to visit every now and then for new kids clothes / yet more stuff from Boots / a nosy at all the clothes I can no longer fit into.  Braehead is the most child friendly round these parts, by an Irish mile.  I spent many happy afternoons of my mat-leave happily quaffing lattes (what calories?) and smiling at the new gurgling person glued to my boobs.  It's got fantastic baby changing and best of all adult toilets that you can fit a pram into for when you're alone with bubba.  Why don't more places have this?!!

To my mind Silverburn is the posher version of Braehead.  It's got way more restaurants to cafes and fancier shops to swoon over such as Kurt Keiger.  The aisles are also wider, making it easier to navigate if you have more than one child.  But the baby changing facilities are shite in comparison to Braehead, tiny, poky wee rooms and no adult + baby loos together for when you're out alone (with the baby that is).  Like Braehead they do also have a great Child Safe scheme, but I'm not quite at that age with TT yet, so am only speaking from my own experience here.

Seeing as we are heading towards Glasgow, lets go into the city centre.  Glasgow city centre is NOT baby friendly.  We have actually been kicked out of places for the audacity of taking a pram anywhere near the premises once whilst looking to meet family for lunch (avoid the extraordinarily rude Lab Bar at all costs if you have a child with you).  I don't want to go to Macky D's or Burger King or KFC thank you very bloody much. I want real food and some easy finger food we can share with the tiny terrorist please!  Moreover I want wine!  Alas, it's just easier to leave the scramblers at home if you fancy imbibing any alcohol at all.  There are a tiny few wonderful places you can take kids (mainly West Brewery, but shhhhhhhhhhh it's a secret) but mostly just accept that you shall never wonder far from Debenhams or John Lewis.  John Lewis preferably, for it's extremely child friendly cafes on 2 floors and excellent breastfeeding and baby changing facilities.

Besides this is the realisation that shopping locally for local seasonal foods is a temporarily lost treat under the toddler years.  It's major chain stores all the way for the time being.  Let's face it, time is tight now, budgets even tighter (UNDERSTATEMENT) and I now need to be armed with babywipes and cheap foods to bribe TT with for each aisle.  My top tip - bags of carrots are super cheap and make great teething toys and crunchies for getting a noisy toddler out of Tesco/Asda/Sainsburies/wherever with any degree of sanity, patience and dignity intact.  Looks saintlier than crisps, costs less than a bag of grapes!

GROAN. How boring parenthood can be!  Never mind the carrots, thank god for the wine aisle.....