Letting kids eat in the car
My car is a mess. It’s been a mess for a long time. Inside the car, I mean. Food crumbs from cookies and chips, sticky residue from candy, stains from liquid spills…you get the idea. And you don’t want to lift up the car seats!
How do other moms keep their cars clean? When anyone at work suggests riding in my car, say if we’re going out to lunch, I quickly throw out the mom-mobile excuse. I’m ashamed of the inside of my car.
My cousin told me she knows a mom who’s car is sparkling clean. This mom forbids the consumption of any food item in the car. What a great idea! “I bet she’s not a working mom”, I told my cousin. And in this case, I was right.
Two days ago, hubby decides to give my car a thorough cleaning. Don’t get the wrong idea, I do try to clean inside my car. I pick up fries from the floor, I mop up spills, I dust off crumbs, I shake the footmats just before we rush indoors to get ready for bedtime. Ocassionally, I run a hand vacuum through the car. And once last summer, I even shampooed all the seats and eliminated all the ‘beneath the car seat uglies’. But when hubby told me he was giving my car a thorough cleanining, he really meant thorough.
Almost an hour into his routine, he summoned me. “See these”, he pointed out the foot mats. “I’m going to thrash them. These are bad, they’re not worth the effort to clean them. Get new ones at Walmart.”
“OK”, I said shame-facedly. Could it be that my car was really that dirty.
Apparently, it was. Because when hubby was done, it felt new and different. I had never cleaned it nearly so well. Thank you Hubby!!!
“See what daddy did!”, I gestured at the seats and floor as the kids settled into their car seats. “We have to keep it clean, so no eating in the car.”
“OK”, both 6 and 2 year old responded.
One day went by with no eating in the car. Yesterday, I grabbed them from childcare as we rushed off to swim class. “Mommy, we’re hungry, we need a snack.” they both wailed.
Hungry kids OR dirty car. Which is the worse evil? I weighed my options and dirty car won. But I swore to myself that it would be a temporary defeat. When we got back home, I made sure to pick up the crumbs. But I must have been tired, because today, I still saw crumbs. I zapped those with the hand vacuum, but I can’t help feeling that this is a losing battle. Any tips?
