Parker has been a climber from a very young age. If I remember correctly, he was a proficient stair climber at 9 months old and he started climbing out of his crib at 18 months old (and was quickly moved into a toddler bed). My point in telling you this is so you will realize that cribs and shopping carts are not much different when it comes to getting out.
Shortly after Mia was born (April maybe?) I was shopping the Target baby section while Abby was at preschool. I had Mia in the car seat and Parker in the big shopping cart basket. He climbed out quite a few times and kept running away like it was a game. I would chase him down and put him back in and tell him in my most loving way not to get out. Okay so really I just told him in a way as to not attract attention to myself from the other shoppers.
Parker got out and ran away again while I was deciding on an item. I turned around and he was gone. Completely nowhere. I tried to listen for him giggling and running but heard nothing. I looked for a few minutes up and down the aisles around the baby section (he loved hiding behind the stroller and car seat displays).
I saw a Target employee and thought gosh this would be so much easier to find him with another set of eyes looking.
"Sir, would you mind helping me look for my little boy? I don't know where he went." and that was the beginning of the code yellow...
He says to me "Okay can you describe him?"
"Yes he's almost 3 years old with blonde hair and is wearing a red shirt and shorts today."
He took out his radio ... "Code yellow, code yellow, code yellow, who's blocking the exits?"
After a few exchanges over the radio they had all Target employees in entire store looking for Parker. They were asking all of the moms and shoppers in the store if anyone had seen him. They had all but one of the cashiers shut down their registers to come look. They had a Target employee stationed at each door.
SO EMBARRASSING! This has been blown way out of proportion. I just wanted one little person to help me look since it was a game to Parker. If he saw me then he'd run away giggling.
After about 4 minutes of code yellow, I walked down the center aisle and looked left and this is what I saw--about 8 Target employees standing in a circle around Parker, asking him what his name was. He was just shyly standing there in the middle of them not saying anything. Then he saw me and broke through the crowd just like in the movies, running to me saying "MOMMMMYYYYY!" with the biggest smile.
No tears. Not scared. Parker! Seriously! I was speechless really. I was wishing that Parker would have at least cried a little bit, but nooooo. He just got happier with all the attention. Is this what "middle child syndrome" is? All the acting out and the I need attention?
I gave him a big hug and picked him up, putting him in the cart again. But I really didn't know what I was supposed to say to him. What did all those employees expect to see me do? What did other moms in my shoes do? I could have yelled at him, I could have had a big talk with him right there in front of everyone, I could have cried with tears of joys (the tears really would have been tears of embarrassment), I could have spanked him (okay then they probably would have taken him back from me for CPS), so in my indecisiveness on how to react I just politely said my Thank You's and headed straight for checkout... we'd talk about this later over chocolate chip cookies and milk.
Oh good I thought. That's over with. Let's leave this store as quickly as possible. I only had a few things to buy, so I went straight to the checkout where the nice older cashier lady took one look at Parker and asked "Are you that little lost boy?"
It would be a month before I would return to that same store, diaper bag full of Smarties to bribe Parker into staying with me... the end.
Thank you Target for finding Parker. But I'm not sure he learned a lesson that day. I think instead he got to have his very own big boy version of hide and go seek.
