This is why my gray hairs are steadily increasing.

Gabrielle has progressed yet further into the Terrible Twos. Her favorite word now is, "Mine!" We are having temper tantrums at a steadily increasing pace. When she gets too frustrated over the difficulties the world is presenting she hits Mommy. And today ...

Oh, I do hate taking the girls shopping. Gabrielle hates, hates, hates to ride in the cart anymore. Arielle likes to ride in the cart sometimes, but only for short periods. Given her way she'd pop in and out of the seat like a prairie dog.

When Gabrielle is out of the shopping cart seat she runs around wildly at odd tangents, forcing me to chase her down. Arielle loves to touch everything, and will occasionally take a running leap to ride on the side of the cart for awhile. (Yes, she has fallen, doing this. No, it did not diminish her enthusiasm for the game. They get this from their father. It's his fault. How could I have known that being an adrenaline junkie was hereditary? It's not a trait that runs in my family!)

I usually wind up being forced to put Gabrielle in the cart to keep her out of trouble, which leads to incredible screaming fits. That little girl has the lung capacity of King Kong, with a higher pitch. She can bring an entire shopping center to a complete stop as everyone looks for the child that is being kidnapped by a crazed orangutan.

I try to let her stay out of the cart as long as I can.

Today, well, today we had to go shopping. I needed chicken for dinner tonight and I just couldn't put it off anymore. Everything went reasonably well, though, and I started to drop my guard. That's when Gabrielle took off.

At first I didn't realize the trouble I was in. She was running down the aisle ahead of me, looking back and laughing at her silly mommy. I followed her, Arielle leading the way. The problem was, Arielle kept stopping to look back at me and proclaim, "She's getting away, Mommy!" I had to stop the cart, or run Arielle down, which meant I kept losing ground to Gabrielle.

When Gabrielle got to the end of the aisle, she turned the corner. I could hear her laughing on the other side of the shelving. I hustled, as much as Arielle would let me, who was becoming increasingly dramatic as her sister got further away, and got around the corner as Gabrielle hit midway. No problem. I'd catch up with her soon, I was sure.

By the time I was midway to the end, though, Gabrielle was around another corner. This time I turned the corner in time to see her rounding a corner also. I turned the cart around, calling to Arielle to follow me, and hurried to the next aisle.

She wasn't there.

Hmm. OK, next aisle.

Not there either.

This is when Mommy started panicking. I dumped the cart and started running up and down the front of the store looking down every aisle and calling my baby.

Nothing.

And here's where I admit, that yes, I am a bad mother. Because while I was afraid for her, I was also thinking, in the back of my mind, "How am I going to explain that I lost my daughter in the grocery store? I'm going to look terrible."

I hadn't figured out a good excuse yet, when Gabrielle appeared from the direction of the produce department, running toward me with great pride at having been able to defeat Mommy so easily.

Yes, there was much screaming for the rest of our shopping trip. She really hates being in the cart.