Every so often, I step back and try to ascertain exactly when my mind went off the rails. I am convinced that one of the primary causes of my insanity can be summed up in two words: school projects.
About twice a year, the little part of my brain that is still somewhat lucid stops to wonder "what in the hell am I doing?" as I contemplate the absolutely unreal amount of time and effort I (and my peers in the super- mom-community) devote towards our childrens' school projects and costumes. (As an aside, when did it become the thing for kids to dress in costumes when presenting reports? It's no longer enough to research and write a compelling report on the life of Cleopatra--we now have to dress in the latest of Nile fashions while delivering it?)
Anyway, prior to becoming a parent, I viewed arts and crafts the same way I viewed two-piece bathing suits and dancing in public: something to be avoided at all costs. However, one of the many things no one tells you before you have children is that once they start school, you will be expected to produce museum-quality art projects out of "things you have lying around the house". I guess they were referring to Martha Stewart's house because I have yet to figure out how to create a model of the Alamo out of empty wine bottles and cat hair. And since I don't happen to live in Martha's house, over the years, I have spent an amount equal to our monthly mortgage payment at Michael's craft store. (For future reference--school project moms are easy to spot at Michael's--we are the ones slumped over our carts, balancing three trifold boards, muttering "science fair" under our breaths and searching for the perfect tacky glue).
So let's go back in time and examine where it all started to go wrong.
My first project assignment was, in my view, a creative triumph. Oddly, others in this house still see it as an epic fail. Either way, I lay it all at the feet of Dr. Seuss. You see, back when my oldest son was in first grade, it was time for the annual celebration of Dr. Seuss' Birthday (this is a big deal in elementary schools...go figure). That year, every child was required to come to school dressed as a character from a Dr. Seuss book.
Mindful of my lack of craft-type abilities in the past, I broke out in a cold sweat and had to put my head between my knees. This was my first test of elementary school motherhood. Any idiot can take care of a baby--it takes tons more skill to make your child successful in first grade. Was I up to the challenge? What if I failed? Would this shoot all his chances for a college scholarship? Etc.
Once the waves of nausea passed, I asked my son which character he wanted to be.
My first project assignment was, in my view, a creative triumph. Oddly, others in this house still see it as an epic fail. Either way, I lay it all at the feet of Dr. Seuss. You see, back when my oldest son was in first grade, it was time for the annual celebration of Dr. Seuss' Birthday (this is a big deal in elementary schools...go figure). That year, every child was required to come to school dressed as a character from a Dr. Seuss book.
Mindful of my lack of craft-type abilities in the past, I broke out in a cold sweat and had to put my head between my knees. This was my first test of elementary school motherhood. Any idiot can take care of a baby--it takes tons more skill to make your child successful in first grade. Was I up to the challenge? What if I failed? Would this shoot all his chances for a college scholarship? Etc.
Once the waves of nausea passed, I asked my son which character he wanted to be.
"I don't care," he said.
I started naming all the Dr. Seuss characters I could think of.
"I don't care," he said again. "Can I go outside and play?"
"I don't care," he said again. "Can I go outside and play?"
My husband put in his two cents: "Let's just go to the store and buy a Cat in the Hat hat and be done with it."
"I don't care," my son said, " I just want to go play."
I thought for a minute and was about to takethe easy way out my husband's advice when I realized that every other kid in that school would be dressed as the Cat in the Hat. Here was an opportunity to rise above the masses and be different. No pedestrian, run-of-the-mill characters for us.
I went into my son's room, grabbed all the Dr. Seuss books off his bookshelf and started paging through them. I immediately rejected the obvious like the Cat in the Hat, Thing 1 and Thing 2, The Grinch, Sam I Am, etc. Those were for the conformists, the slackers. The Nutmegger family was more creative than that.
Eureka! Finally I had it. One of my favorite Dr. Seuss books (though my kids loathed it) is The Sleep Book. There is a character in that book called the Jedd (presumably because it rhymes with "bed", but with Dr. Seuss, you never know). The Jedd is covered in some kind of weird pompom-type furry things (or something like that--it's been a while).
My brain was racing--I COULD MAKE A JEDD COSTUME. No other kid would be dressed as a Jedd (red flag #1: ignored). My kid would be praised for "his" creativity and would stand out amongst all the Cats in the Hat (red flag #2: ignored).
I would take an old sweatshirt and one of my husband's ball caps and cover them in furry pompoms. Genius.
My plan formulated, I jumped in my car, raced to Michael's, and in the throes of my heretofore unknown/untapped creativity, bought several bags of neon colored pompoms and my first glue gun.
I returned home and afterseveral first degree burns carefully following the hot glue gun directions, I began gluing the pompoms to the hat and the sweatshirt. I glued and glued and glued. Dinnertime came and I was still gluing. My husband and son tiptoed around me, frightened by the maniacal look in my eyes. Finally I was finished.
I stepped back from my masterpiece. "Voila!" I announced.
"What is it?" my husband asked.
"It's a Jedd" (what is WRONG with these people?)
"I don't want to wear that," my son wailed, "it looks stupid. I want to be the Cat in the Hat."
"Are you kidding me? You'll be the hit of Dr. Seuss Day. No one else has such a creative mom who would spend literally ten hours gluing pompoms. Not even Martha Stewart would have thought of this."
He went away in a sulk. The next morning I dressed him in his Jedd costume and sent him off to amaze his classmates. I spent the day anxiously awaiting pick-up time so I could find out how it went. When he got in the car he was quiet. "How did Dr. Seuss Day go? Did they like your Jedd? Did you win a prize?"
"I was the only kid dressed in stupid pompoms. Everyone else was the Cat in the Hat. No one knew who I was and I had to spend the whole day telling people which book I was from."
I was indignant. How dare these people not know what a Jedd was? How dare they not rewardmy his creativity? Any slacker busy parent can slap a Cat in the Hat hat on a kid's head and call it a day. We went above and beyond!
At this point, a rational person would have been thinking: I spent ten freaking hours gluing on pompoms when a five dollar Cat in the Hat hat from the party store would have been cheaper, much less time consuming and saved my son from going to school dressed in furry pompoms (a fact that 10 years later, he still remembers).
In case you haven't guessed by now, I am not that rational person.
"I told you so," my husband replied when I vented my frustrations to him later that evening. "Why didn't you just let him do what he wanted? It was HIS costume, wasn't it? No one asked you to glue hundreds of pompoms to one of my hats."
"Who asked for your opinion?" I spat out. "This was a freaking awesome costume and they were just all too stupid to appreciate it."
"You have to let the kids do these things themselves. After all, what are they learning if YOU do all the work?"
(Ten years and three kids later, I have two words for him: PINEWOOD DERBY. Who was it who spent hours in the garage sanding and adding graphite to tiny wheels to gain a millisecond more speed? Who made me order bags of expensive tungsten weights from Amazon to make the car(s) half an ounce heavier in the back? Who spent hours on the phone with MY FATHER looking for hints on how he built winning cars for my brothers a million years ago? Who searched hundreds of websites looking for the perfect aerodynamic shape that would bring victory (and a tiny little trophy) to the Nutmegger house? Oh, and while all this was going on, where was the 8 year old Cub Scout whose name would be on the car? Watching TV, obviously).
I rest my case.
So here we are. That first grader is now in high school and his brother and sister have celebrated their own Dr. Seuss birthdays and completed approximately 1,500 additional school projects.
I would like to be able to report that I learned my lesson from what is referred to as "the Jedd Incident" and that I never went overboard for a school project/costume again. I would like to be able to say that I never stayed up half the night trying eight different types of glue trying to find one that allowed me to cover a picture frame with plastic gemstones so that they didn't keep randomly falling off like the dripping of a leaky faucet. I would like to be able to tell you that I never accidentally stapled a piece of cardstock to my dining room table and then attempted to pry it off with a screwdriver.
And I would love to righteously assert that when MY children are assigned dioramas, trifold boards, science fair inventions, Greek god costumes and scale models of the Parthenon constructed entirely out of sugar cubes, they spend hours painstakingly putting together their own work and taking pride in their own creativity.
Yeah, right.
"I don't care," my son said, " I just want to go play."
I thought for a minute and was about to take
I went into my son's room, grabbed all the Dr. Seuss books off his bookshelf and started paging through them. I immediately rejected the obvious like the Cat in the Hat, Thing 1 and Thing 2, The Grinch, Sam I Am, etc. Those were for the conformists, the slackers. The Nutmegger family was more creative than that.
Eureka! Finally I had it. One of my favorite Dr. Seuss books (though my kids loathed it) is The Sleep Book. There is a character in that book called the Jedd (presumably because it rhymes with "bed", but with Dr. Seuss, you never know). The Jedd is covered in some kind of weird pompom-type furry things (or something like that--it's been a while).
My brain was racing--I COULD MAKE A JEDD COSTUME. No other kid would be dressed as a Jedd (red flag #1: ignored). My kid would be praised for "his" creativity and would stand out amongst all the Cats in the Hat (red flag #2: ignored).
I would take an old sweatshirt and one of my husband's ball caps and cover them in furry pompoms. Genius.
My plan formulated, I jumped in my car, raced to Michael's, and in the throes of my heretofore unknown/untapped creativity, bought several bags of neon colored pompoms and my first glue gun.
I returned home and after
I stepped back from my masterpiece. "Voila!" I announced.
"What is it?" my husband asked.
"It's a Jedd" (what is WRONG with these people?)
"I don't want to wear that," my son wailed, "it looks stupid. I want to be the Cat in the Hat."
"Are you kidding me? You'll be the hit of Dr. Seuss Day. No one else has such a creative mom who would spend literally ten hours gluing pompoms. Not even Martha Stewart would have thought of this."
 |
| My masterpiece. Is it weird that I still have this? |
He went away in a sulk. The next morning I dressed him in his Jedd costume and sent him off to amaze his classmates. I spent the day anxiously awaiting pick-up time so I could find out how it went. When he got in the car he was quiet. "How did Dr. Seuss Day go? Did they like your Jedd? Did you win a prize?"
"I was the only kid dressed in stupid pompoms. Everyone else was the Cat in the Hat. No one knew who I was and I had to spend the whole day telling people which book I was from."
I was indignant. How dare these people not know what a Jedd was? How dare they not reward
At this point, a rational person would have been thinking: I spent ten freaking hours gluing on pompoms when a five dollar Cat in the Hat hat from the party store would have been cheaper, much less time consuming and saved my son from going to school dressed in furry pompoms (a fact that 10 years later, he still remembers).
In case you haven't guessed by now, I am not that rational person.
"I told you so," my husband replied when I vented my frustrations to him later that evening. "Why didn't you just let him do what he wanted? It was HIS costume, wasn't it? No one asked you to glue hundreds of pompoms to one of my hats."
"Who asked for your opinion?" I spat out. "This was a freaking awesome costume and they were just all too stupid to appreciate it."
"You have to let the kids do these things themselves. After all, what are they learning if YOU do all the work?"
(Ten years and three kids later, I have two words for him: PINEWOOD DERBY. Who was it who spent hours in the garage sanding and adding graphite to tiny wheels to gain a millisecond more speed? Who made me order bags of expensive tungsten weights from Amazon to make the car(s) half an ounce heavier in the back? Who spent hours on the phone with MY FATHER looking for hints on how he built winning cars for my brothers a million years ago? Who searched hundreds of websites looking for the perfect aerodynamic shape that would bring victory (and a tiny little trophy) to the Nutmegger house? Oh, and while all this was going on, where was the 8 year old Cub Scout whose name would be on the car? Watching TV, obviously).
I rest my case.
So here we are. That first grader is now in high school and his brother and sister have celebrated their own Dr. Seuss birthdays and completed approximately 1,500 additional school projects.
I would like to be able to report that I learned my lesson from what is referred to as "the Jedd Incident" and that I never went overboard for a school project/costume again. I would like to be able to say that I never stayed up half the night trying eight different types of glue trying to find one that allowed me to cover a picture frame with plastic gemstones so that they didn't keep randomly falling off like the dripping of a leaky faucet. I would like to be able to tell you that I never accidentally stapled a piece of cardstock to my dining room table and then attempted to pry it off with a screwdriver.
And I would love to righteously assert that when MY children are assigned dioramas, trifold boards, science fair inventions, Greek god costumes and scale models of the Parthenon constructed entirely out of sugar cubes, they spend hours painstakingly putting together their own work and taking pride in their own creativity.
Yeah, right.
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