What it's like taking kids to the post office.

Kid-free me going to the post office:
I open the door, walk in, go get in the line, wait, go online on my phone til it's my turn, get called, go tell the worker that i want this mailed, wait in silence, answer questions appropriately, pay and leave.

Today, while Eli was in school, I decided to take Liam and Brielle to the post office.  Here's how it went.

First of all, the doors are about 1 cm wider than my double stroller, so holding the door open and trying to squeeze them in is always a task.  Thank goodness.... 90% of the time, someone holds the door for me.  As soon as I get in, I have to do a sharp 90 degree turn and try to get another door open.  Then there are the stairs.  I have to bump the stroller up 4 stairs backwards.  Not too bad if I don't have a lot of boxes but when I do, that's an added challenge.  Next comes the line part.  In my post office, there are two lines and the one I have to get in is always too small (ropes) for us to fit.  So I have to figure out how to get the little rope things moved out of the way.  Not too big of a problem, but when I do that, I have now made it impossible for me to fit when I loop back around and get to the window.  When I'm in line, I spend most of my time convincing Liam not to touch the ropes, not to bother the people, to sit down, and that we will be leaving soon.  When it's finally our turn, this is what me standing at the window sounds like.

"Yes, I'd like to mail these priority."  "liam sit DOWN." "no, liam, sit DOWN."  "I said sit DOWN."  "if you don't get back in that stroller, you're going to be in big trouble."  "I'm sorry..could you repeat that? No, nothing fragile."  "Liam. Sit. Down."  "No, you can't stick your hand through the slot." "No, the lady is busy."  "Ok..say hi to the lady." "No, we can't go. We have to pay to mail the package."  "No, you can't have a snack right now." "SIT DOWN."  "I said sit down."  etc etc etc.

Sigh.