It’s that time of year again, our tiny humans are growing up
and being shoved out the door to start new chapters in their lives. It’s the day all mothers live for, BACK
TO SCHOOL!! The 1st day
of school outfits have been picked out, the brand new shoes are shiny and ready
to go, the new back packs are packed with the $500 worth of school supplies and
enough hand sanitizer and glue sticks to supply the entire country of
Malawi. This year, it
was brought to my attention by another blogger’s blog that I may have committed
a cardinal sin for the last 2 years and didn’t know. I took my daughter’s backpack and had her name
stitched on the front pocket. I’m
that mother that will have her name and/or initials put on anything and everything so it only
seemed natural that her school bag should have her name too so as there was no confusion that the giant red and white polka dot Jansport with the
Minnie Mouse cheer bow zipper charm belonged to my baby. I had no idea that I had just given all
the information necessary for child predators, convicts, and the Monogrammed
Mom Squad needed to publicly ridicule me and beat me down for being the worst
mother on the planet. It really
only took me a few seconds and a few keystrokes to let them know, sometimes
fashion comes second to nothing. I
have the blisters from Manolos to prove this. We decided to live on the dangerous side. It’s been 2 years and oddly
enough, she’s still in our possession so YAY us for managing not lose our
child.
My daughter started 2nd grade this year and our
expectations vs. her expectations have been slightly a miss. My daughter likes to “forget”
things. Last year we “forgot” 3
lunch boxes, 2 jackets and a pair of shoestrings. To this day, I still don’t know how we lose our
shoestrings….I guess that will be one of life’s little mysteries. What she can remember is that she
didn’t like her sandwich for lunch and she wants her $0.75 for her orange
popsicle everyday. Today was
no different. She forgot her
homework folder. So in my
attempt to teach her responsibility and consequences we had a short chat. In which it was relayed to her that
since she forgot her homework, she would not be allowed any IPAD time tonight. For those of you with 7-year-old girls,
you know where this headed, fast and in a hurry. Tears, lots of big crocodile tears. A 7-year-old girl can fall on her sword and
weep like no other human being on this planet. There is a lot of drama and wailing and arms. It almost makes you want to give in
just so the madness of it all will stop, but you have the inner voice telling
you to be strong, you can’t be worn down by a 7-year-old. They smell fear and defeat. The screams are so traumatic.
After dinner she came up to me in her sweetest little girl
voice and said she wanted to go shopping, would I take her shopping. Now, normally I would have delighted in her new revolution to go spend daddy's money and give me an excuse to spend daddy's money. But alas, the times they are tough with the recession, army cut backs, and my ability to not use my Nordstrom credit card. Relunctantly, I started with the excuse that mama
didn’t have any money. So she
suggested she could use her money.
Now I may have paused and actually pondered this and then I snapped out
of my Target day dream and reminded her that she was in trouble and that I wouldn’t
be rewarding her by taking her toy shopping. Again, crying.
Lots of crying. The kind of
crying that Grandma can hear from over 7 hours away. Ironically, I get a text that says to go ahead and
give her the special box that will be showing up today, she deserves it. How do they know???? It was clothes so I knew the wow factor
wouldn’t be near as big as the American Girl Gymnastic Set we’ve been eyeing on
YouTube. I love it when I
can crush dreams. I had
already rented a movie for her so I decided we would watch that. After it was over we went to
return it and while we’re in the car she asks me if the only thing she can do tonight
is just watch her TV. So we have
the talk again, you’re not getting the Ipad or your phone to play on YouTube. Again she asks, “so I can only watch my
TV?”, yes, that’s all you can do.
So then with her sneaky eyes she says, “so I can watch Netflix?” DAMN YOU ROKU SMART TV! She almost had me. So once again we have the talk, No you
can’t have Netflix, you can’t have YouTube, You cannot hook up to anything on
the Internet. Nice try kid. Crying again. I can’t handle the crying. Because now I want to cry and I’m
driving and drinking while driving apparently is frowned upon. At least I think it is here, we
are in Alabama so who knows, it may very well be acceptable. I should look into this. The only thing I can think of is
the McDonalds that’s right next-door.
I will bribe her with ice cream!!!
What kid doesn’t want ice cream???
Nope, she wants chicken nuggets.
Another conversation about how we just had supper we’re not eating
supper again. Ice Cream is the
only option on the table. Commence
sad face. She’ll pass. Until I actually pull out of the
parking lot and onto the busiest street in town, she’s changed her mind; she’ll
take ice cream. OH MY BLOODY HELL
WHATS WRONG WITH THESE KIDS?????
Sorry, kiddo you missed out, say what you mean, mean what you say. Crying again.
I’m not sure when this crying thing stops. I’ve heard tales of never. That just seems so depressing to
me. I need something to look
forward too. I never did drugs, I
didn’t drink while I was pregnant, I did eat an abnormally large amount of
cheese is this what has caused the emotions? Is it the dreaded gluten? Why are our daughters so emotional???? Tomorrow is a new day with new
possibilities and opportunities. I’m
hoping we come home with our shoestrings and lunchbox and the homework
folder. I hope we get to sit by
our bestie on the school bus. I
hope that when I research the open container law in Lower Alabama it makes me smile,
I need a good reason to get that elusive way too expensive Yeti tumbler. But most of all, I hope tomorrow
is a tear free day!!!
