Rednecks have nuthin' on us.

On this 4th of July I find myself surrounded by family. Naturally, after 3 hours this drives me to look for things to do on the computer with headphones on. You can now follow me on Pinterest, ask me about canning, and wait for updates on the family lemonade stand.
A few weeks ago all four kids helped me prepare gifts for their teachers, which is to say that they agreed to go with me to the mall to get them. Running out of time and daylight, I began our journey to the needed mall, 45 minutes away.
All was going well until we got out of the car. About 100 feet from the entrance I look back to confirm I still had 4 kids following me to see Cortlan wearing his duct tape hat, filthy shirt and 5 day-old shorts.

This picture was taken weeks later... it's the same shirt.

This mall was kinda swanky, making Cortlan stand out in a rather "southern" way. Cortlan's cleanliness is a different blog post; let's just say that as a 12-year-old boy, clean underwear is a burden.

Unfortunately, how we looked paled in comparison to how we acted.

Walking through the mall, you would have thought my kids grew up in a barn. They went absolutely hog wild when they saw... the...
escalators.

Step aside Six Flags, we got this.

It must have snuck up on them while they were distracted by the food court goodness, but once they saw it, they latched on. Running up, down, trying to ride the mobile banister and using unsuspecting mall patrons as slalom markers.

STAY AWAY FROM THE LAVA!!!!!!!!!!

After pulling them away from their newfangled mecca, I went to the Teavana store to procure aforementioned gift. Looking back to make sure nobody had made a break for the escalators, I saw all four kids crawling over the rental strollers. They mistakenly thought them toys because the carts look like racing cars. Rowan in particular did a great impression of Dale Earnhart... with a docked stroller.
Next on our child-laden episode of the Beverley Hillbillies, I had this idea that the kids would like some ice cream. Now, this mall was ritzy enough that they had a Hagen-Das store in a prime location. I'm a tightwad though and Dairy Queen is much cheaper. We purchased some small cones (it was 8:30pm) and began making our way out of the mall. I should tell you that during this 45 minute excursion into the mall, Rowan had to pee no less than 3 times.
Alas, our fun and games came to a screeching halt 150 feet from the exit, when I realized I had left my $75 worth of tea on the Dairy Queen counter. Desperate times called for desperate measures and I left my filthy, ice cream coated ruffians at a specific mall corner so I could make the run back to the counter in hopes that my entire trip was not wasted. Mercifully the goods were where I left them, but several mall patrons may have vision imparement after watching me and all my fat rolls huff & puff to the Dairy Queen.
We went straight to the car where I drove home in Atlanta traffic to happily ice cream-ed children.

Repeatedly asking them "are you going to finish that?"