How to Jelly-Fill Your Saturday Morning Errands

  by Chris Horst

Running errands does not have to be boring. Infuse a donut adventure amidst the stops at the hardware store and bank, and you’ll quickly vault from arm-twister to hero.

I started our donut errand adventure on a recent Saturday morning by sketching out a few rudimentary donut drawings, mapping our route on Google Maps, and grabbing some colored pencils on the way out the door. At our first donut shop, Walton Donuts, Desmond (age: 3) picked out a classic glazed donut covered in chocolate and topped with sprinkles. No surprise there. Sprinkles are like eye magnets for kids. The doughnut lady gave us our donut for free, because, well, I have a cute kid. We split the donut down the “middle” (OK, I’ll shoot straight: I prorated the cut based on our respective weights. Fair isn’t always equal!).

Donut Coloring

En route to our next donut shop, Desmond colored his first donut drawing. We took care of a few odds-and-ends and arrived shortly at our second donut shop—Voodoo Donuts. I picked the donut this time, selecting a delicious “mango tango” jelly-filled delight. We split it and also worked on our arithmetic skills (“One donut, two donuts…” — I know, it’s a stretch.). Desmond colored his second picture as we wrapped up the final items on my to-do list.

We concluded our morning with a stop at Whole Foods, where Desmond chose a “French Toast” cake doughnut. It was the sort of donut that made you question why you don’t eat donuts every single morning.

Desi Eating Donut

Moment of honesty: He wasn’t into coloring his third donut. I’m tired of coloring donuts, daddy. You can’t win ’em all. If you have an older kid, perhaps coloring is totally out of the equation. But, I’d be willing to bet your older children would love to Instagram their donut adventures.

It was a great morning. I finished all the items on my to-do list and had a blast enjoying donuts with my bambino. As we drove home, he suggested we do it again sometime (maybe next time we’ll trying making our own). And for this dad, that makes this morning a success.

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Postscript: Need more Saturday morning ideas? Try constructing an obstacle course or at-home science experiments.

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Photos courtesy of Chris and Alli Horst.