How far a mother will go to stay on budget:
Even though we already have a beautiful bassinet that my aunt bought for us, it will only keep the baby comfy for so long. So we will eventually need a crib. I knew the new styles that convert into a bed later would be a money saver, but besides that I hadn’t started really looking.
Although I think many of the cribs at Vancouver’s baby stores are gorgeous we simply can’t afford to spend a ton of money on baby things and I had already decided that I would rather splurge on a stroller than a crib. So I knew that I was looking for a simple model and I had a few ideas from past nanny jobs. One crib from IKEA was affordable and would serve us just fine despite being nothing special to look at but I was still thinking maybe I could get a prettier crib on a shopping trip across the border.
Then one evening I was stuck in traffic after a long day at work and daydreaming of getting home to have a nap when I heard that IKEA was having a midnight madness sale. There are two items from the store that I had already decided I needed for the nursery and I also had the crib in my mind.
Despite being exhausted I rallied the last of my energy and decided to brave the crowds in the hopes of saving us some money. I knew exactly where the items were in the store and I decided I would look only at those things and if any were on sale I would grab them.
IKEA on a slow day is an exercise in parking physics. I usually opt for the distant spots, the kind that should have a shuttle bus to the store, because it’s actually a time saver instead of driving around looking for a closer spot.
On midnight madness day, parking at IKEA is at best an improbability if not impossibility. I finally found a spot after about 20 minutes of laps and many near fender benders (in my Mom’s car).
True to plan I ignored the posters advertising amazing deals for every hour of the day and plowed through screaming kids, exhausted parents and blissful new couples looking to pad their love nests and headed straight for the kids section. Two of the items I wanted were not on sale. One has been in the store for damn near 10 years and hasn’t been on sale for an hour in that time. But my ho-hum crib was significantly reduced in price.
I was now intent on securing this particular bed at this exact moment despite having months of my pregnancy left to shop around. I ran (No, waddled.) to the warehouse aisles lined to the ceiling with stock and found only four of my cribs left. Ahhh!
I ran (waddled) back to the parking lot with one of those paper IKEA tape measures to see if the crib would fit. I had to fight off glazed-over zombie shoppers still waiting to find a spot and get inside. Warning: returning to your vehicle for any other reason than to leave the lot is a safety risk.
To my dismay my measurements told me the crib wouldn’t fit. I decided that this was a trivial problem. I would buy the crib and worry about getting it home afterwards. To me I saw the options as being; beg an employee to help me attach it to the outside of the car somehow or sit in the lot (to the dismay of everyone still circling) and wait for hours until I could get my parents to come with their truck.
I went back inside, bought the crib and left it at the loading dock while I went to get the car.
Again, when I went out to my car I had many idlers stalking me, just waiting for me to leave. I really felt the pressure to vacate my spot as quickly as possible. It was really stressful trying to maneuver my car out of the spot while three different vehicles jostled behind me all waiting to try to beat the other in. Because of them I could only back up and pull out in one direction. But as soon as I tried to drive away, one car waiting for my spot refused to reverse even an inch to let me by. I guessed he was afraid that reversing slightly would appear to the other parking lot hunters as surrendering his territory. So he stayed put, which kept me blocking my spot. He was motioning to me to go the other way but there was no way I could turn around now.
So when he finally backed up an inch to let me drive past him I, in all my mother-to-be class, yelled, “stay out of my way…MOTHERFUCKER!”
I immediately felt ashamed of my behaviour, but I was overcome by the tension in the air. It was only after I tried to slip past the next car that that driver informed me the lane was one way and I was going against the grain. The other guy was just trying to tell me I couldn’t exit that way. Oops!
Embarrassed at how vulgar I was, especially considering I was there to buy a crib, I headed to the loading dock. But within 50 feet of my destination I got stuck behind two cars jostling for the same spot. I was entertained as I watched a woman in a mini van quickly slide herself into the spot while the other vehicle was cautiously backing into it.
But my bemusement turned to boredom and then irritation as the one driver abandoned his vehicle, blocking my path, to berate the other for stealing his spot. After repeatedly demanding that she vacate the precious spot it became clear I would be sitting in the lot forever if I didn’t haul my pregnant ass over and convince his humiliated passenger to move their vehicle. But as I went to get out of my car, I was trapped by another car trying to back out of the spot beside me.
So there we all sat. Confused, stubborn, resigned. No one was moving for anyone else. The sale and the subsequent parking lot mayhem had eaten away at our common sense and none of us knew how to untangle ourselves.
Finally, as she grabbed her purse and headed off to shop it was obvious that the woman had no intention of handing over the spot and the angry man had no choice but to admit defeat and begin circling the lot again. I was finally free to cross the 50 feet to the loading dock and the guy beside me could finally leave his spot to the crowd that had formed behind us.
From there it was smooth sailing. An IKEA employee (who probably has a masters in physics) managed to fit the boxed crib into the back of the tiny car and I made it out of the lot with a couple more near misses and some curses that I was decent enough to utter under my breath instead of yell out the window.
The experience was exhausting, but the crib was a great bargain!
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