When I was little, I remember being extremely self-conscience. I hated that about myself then...and still hate it about myself even today. So imagine my excitement when I have daily reminders that I get a second chance at helping lovely little girl through those exact same crazy emotions. AND TODAY TAKES THE CAKE!
Our elementary school has these great ideas for a fundraiser. There is no selling of lame products or actually nice but crazy over-priced products to neighbors and friends (or me!). They call them Pay-To-Play Days - your kid brings a dollar to school and they can wear a mustache on Mustache Day or crazy socks on Crazy-Sock Day, or a tutu or tie on whatever that day was! You get the gist. Fun and easy and totally up to the kids if they want to participate! I've always loved this take on fundraising...UNTIL Olivia came along!
Olivia is completely in love with the IDEA of the whole thing and talks about it for weeks and plans it out and is soooo excited...UNTIL the day of. That morning is filled with anxiety and extreme emotions. No, actually, she's usually super excited UNTIL the second I pull into the school parking lot and she is supposed to get out of the car! On crazy hair day, we actually had to come home and wash out her all her red and blue piggy tails before she could calm down enough to think about going to school! Self-conciousness at its worst!!
I find myself re-living all those same emotions right along-side her...but luckily now I just find the whole thing soooo funny! I totally think my old-age perspective, experience and ancient wisdom can help her through this, right?!?! We've talked about how she doesn't have to do it and how it's just an extra/crazy thing if kids want to do it. No pressure whatsoever! But still, she gets excited about the idea and wants to participate...every single time. Ugh.
So today is 'Crazy Hat Day'. Liv is SO excited about wearing a new pink/sequiny/shiny baseball hat she has recently fallen in love with. I truly thought this might be her turning point. She even took her own dollar to pay with...shows commitment, right?!?!
Well, on the way to school, she is all hatted-up and ready to go (and looking SOOO cute, btw!) As the kids are climbing out of the car, I make the crucial mistake of asking Liv where her hat is. UGH! She starts frantically looking around and then start mumbling/wailing/whining/crying (rather incoherently) that it blew off her head. I am beyond confused thinking that it blew off her head when she walked to the car and she just didn't bother to pick it up...things like that don't usually occur to this funny child! And now she has tears streaming down her face and refuses to even get out the the car!
I tell her it's fine and we can go find it...so after we get home and can't see the hat on the driveway, she finally wails even louder that it blew off when she stuck her head out the window to yell goodbye to Garrett at the bus stop as we drove past him! WHAT?!?!? How did she not notice? She said she thought it was just her hoodie flapping around in the wind! HAHAHAHA! And we searched the street and it's now where to be found....so now her life is ruined. True story...a totally ruined life. Dumb hat!
So after multiple times of her saying she wants to go to school and then her refusing to get out of the car (much to the bewilderment of the cute 5th grader safety-patrol helpers who kindly open her door for her at the front of the school), we head home for her to calm down and figure out her life!
She finally gets her act together and we walk into school...and HOUR late! And what does the random lady at the front desk say when we walk in..."Where's your hat, little girl? It's crazy hat day!" HA! If she only knew!
