Bye, kids — Mommy’s gonna hang in the pool with an umbrella drink… or spend the day crying on the couch.
Johannesburg, South Africa – Jeanette Amy Prescott-Budd has written a piece that explains the hilarity, honesty and honour of sending your kids to school.
Facebook on the first day of school: If anyone has forgotten to post a picture of their child’s first day of school, do it now, do it quickly before it’s too late!
Every year is the same, which I quite like, it does, however, makes us adults feel a little more ancient with each passing year. This isn’t a South African thing it’s worldwide and why not? My son is in grade eleven this year, so the novelty has worn off, well, to be honest, it hasn’t really worn off, but he would kill me, I am threatened with a fate worse than death if I even mention his name on Facebook, never mind pop a picture on.
Mom, stop being so lame, nothing is ever private in this house”! The problem is that our kids give us so much to laugh about, why not share it.
The first day of big school: Since the day they were born we knew that grade one was inevitable and we knew it would be the year that they turned seven, but are we ever really ready?
It’s the 1st December and we all promise ourselves that before Christmas we are going to have all the stationery bought, all the books covered, school uniforms hemmed and altered as we all buy three sizes too big so that this little 4ft thing can grow into them.
Most of the time the clothes are worn out, or in the case of boys and some girls, torn to shreds. So we have to buy new kit anyway and then in our wisdom, we decide to go another size up, they can roll up their sleeves, we can make the hem bigger and they can wear a tighter belt…
Sometimes we buy shoes that are a little bit too big, just in case my child’s feet grow an entire shoe size overnight. It has never happened in the history of the world, but one day it just may, and my child will be covered. My child takes a size eight, but I am not taking any chances by tomorrow morning he could be a size nine, that’s it I am buying a size nine to be safe.
In reality, the Christmas deadline of being school ready comes and goes and on the night before the first day of school every mother in town is frantically covering books and writing their child’s name on every single item that goes anywhere near the school.
They soon find out that this is a waste of time, my daughter would often come home wearing other children’s clothes, and once after P.E. a little boy’s undies, I didn’t ask, I didn’t really want to know!
The one thing you have to do is have their hair cut on the absolute last day of holidays, as hair, like feet could possible grow extra fast during the last day of the holidays. So we all dash off to the barber or hairdresser the day before school starts. They cut your child’s hair perfectly and just as you are about to leave you say to the hairdresser, please cut their fringe shorter, so that I don’t have to come back too soon!
The hairdresser knowing you are their client, obeys you, much to your child’s horror! In the car on the way home, your child tries frantically to pull their fringe down so that maybe it will grow to a suitable length by the next morning.
Another thing we as mothers do on the first day of school is scrub their little faces, so clean and so raw that they shine. Every other day a quick wipe with a facecloth suffices, but that’s not good enough for the first day of school, be it grade one or any other year. After the first week, this wears off and then for the remainder of the year if you are lucky you get to wipe their faces with the back of your sleeve while they are getting out of the car, as their breakfast cereal is still a main feature on their little cherub faces.
So they start their school career, meet their new best friends and that’s the day that they begin carving out their entire future. They have to walk into school with clothes way too big, a fringe which is actually too short to really be called fringe and a brightly scrubbed pink face. What an impression!
After the first week anything you ask them about their day, no matter how complex and in detail your question is, their answer will be “fine”.
Enjoy every school day, they fly by and before you know it you will be sending them off to varsity in the correct size clothes, no fringe cuts and if you are exceptionally lucky they may have covered their own books, just remember that you got them there with every sleeve wipe of their little faces, and take a bow.
The first day of school is a big deal. What did your child or children say to you when you collected them from school yesterday?
Mine said “fine”
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