Quick trip to Earth Fare 2

Today I got a $10 off coupon from Earth Fare, our local health food store. There are a few items we can only find at Earth Fare, and we were running low on them, so I figured I should get over there and take advantage of the coupon and get them.

Normally we do pickup for our groceries, but Earth Fare uses Instacart for their grocery delivery which charges more per individual item, plus a fee for using their service, plus a tip for the shopper. And I think they don’t take EBT for Instacart for Earth Fare as well. So I had to go in the actual store. Brad wanted to spend his energy doing other things, so I went with just Hestia.

I took my wheelchair since walking around grocery stores usually makes my hips ache. So I had Hestia (wearing her pink service dog dress) on my lap as well as a shopping basket on my lap! It was hard making sure nothing fell off my lap!

I was able to zip around the store and get almost everything I needed in one basket. Brad’s salsas were on sale, so I got 8 of them. I got four of my ginger-lemon-honey drink that cures my nausea, and several other items. My basket was super heavy! When I was trying to reach the frozen mango (because they are the only place that sells Brad’s favorite frozen mango brand), I nearly dropped Hestia trying to juggle the basket, the freezer door, and my very full basket!

I got everything except popcorn, which just wouldn’t fit in my totally full basket. So I brought my basket up front and left it at customer service while I got another basket full of popcorn (this is the only store that sells the popcorn Brad and I like).

I was surprised no one said anything to me while I was shopping about Hestia, my wheelchair, or my struggles getting things in my basket. I went to check out, and as I’m trying to actually do my paying, a man comes up to me and starts talking with me about Hestia and how beautiful she is. I tried to say thank you and use the tone of my voice plus my body language to indicate that I was busy at the moment trying to input PIN numbers and pay with two cards (because we had to get dishwasher detergent which EBT doesn’t cover, so I had to pay for that with a credit card). Luckily he left me alone fairly quickly.

Then I had to wait a few minutes for someone to be free to help me get my things out to the van.

After we got the bags loaded into the van, I took a couple of selfies with Hestia to commemorate our outing. It was only 8 years ago that I couldn’t drive, and even if I could drive, I couldn’t have gone to the grocery store without Brad. Now with Hestia’s help, I’m able to drive myself to the store and do a whole shopping trip all by myself! And do so without days of planning in advance!

The pictures are below, and I have medium length curly brown hair, and am wearing a turquoise shirt with a rainbow mask. Hestia is a white and black Japanese Chin wearing a pink service dog dress. There is blue sky with clouds in the background and wind is blowing our hair.