AIBU to introduce you to Ms. Label Checker

[HappyDays40]

Imagine a busy school playground if you will. It is pissing with rain in the North West of England, just a normal day. Mrs. Last Minute (this is me) has turned her five year old out of the car seconds before we are classed as late and the young ones play in the playground just before Mrs. Perfect Teacher lets them into the school. The parents stand talking waiting for the door to open meaning they can escape and Ms. Label Checker is waiting with her jumper -less of offspring who is pointing his finger at individual children. Upon extension of the finger, Ms. Label Checker pounce s at one of the young prey picking the littlest off first. Within a second she has applied the glasses and is peeling back the neck of the jumper that the young prey is still wearing.
Ahmed squirms weakly under vice like grip of her Salomon as she casts him aside screeching "no not you". Ahmed is followed by Meghan, Reece and Saeed who are similarly cast aside.
The playground is quiet and the young ones wimper and hide behind their parents. In a label checking frenzy Ms. Label Checker reaches for a child named Hannah when one dad valiantly steps in and shouts "not my kid". This send a Spartacus style ripple through the parents who start defendiong the young ones saying " not my child" . Ms. Label Checker is stopped in her tracks, she has no one target and is becoming the prey. Realising the her time is numbered she screeches at the parents to check the labels of their jumpers because Chris has lost the six jumpers she bought at the start of term. Sara's s mum tells Ms. Label Checker that she can't just go around pulling at the kids jumpers and is she bloody nuts?
Ms. Label Checker admits defeat saying that she is sick of other kids stealing Chris's jumpers. Ahmeds auntie Charles around in her bag a produce s s spare jumper saying Chris can have it. Ms. Label Checker has some brass neck, snatches it off Ahmeds mum and rams it on Chris's head stating that is was probably Chris's anyway. Ahmed gracious mum shows M s. Label Checker a name " Ahmed Arif"it read. To which Ms. Label Checker stated " well you can all just fuck off ". And that my friends is the beginning of a story.

@DeepaBeesKit

Doesnt anyone sew in labels properly any more?

I do. Not a single item of uniform lost [SMUG!!].

I do, and have recently had a lost jumper find it's way into DS's school bag a full 9 months after he lost it, in a different school building (moved from onside nursery to reception).

It no longer fits, and I'm curious about where it has been vacationing all this time, but still rather impressed by the homing power of a sewn in label.

@PlanDeRaccordement

Shouldn’t be driving to school and then idling the car by the school gates.

Completely agree but I'm not sure what that has to do with this thread?

When I was 8 - I wrote “Mine” on the inside of my plimsoles.

Worked for me. Was one of 7. You didn’t lose anything ever.

I also took my 6 year old to have his school shoes replaced as they were looking really tatty…..when the lady measured his feet she said that the shoes were two sizes too big …. so no idea who’s shoes he was wearing and what poor pet had a pair two sizes too small ….

@ThePlumVan yes, I'm afraid many kids are indeed a bit stinky. Many because some parents are using a shit-tonne of very identifiable fabric conditioners in their wash but sadly, an important few in every year because their parents couldn't give a shiny shit and clothes were rarely washed and accumulated neck grease, food and occasionally poo or urine stains.
Generally their was a happy medium of not overly laundered, and not, thankfully the notifiably neglectful. But some things I saw broke my heart.

I had to go in one day when ds came home with a jumper so small he could barely squeeze into it. It was easy to see who had his on, it looked like a dress on his very small friend!

One of my child's cardigans turned up after the winter ended, having been somehow deposited under a bush the previous autumn.

That was bizarre. We had looked everywhere. Under a flipping bush in the playground

I had bought the bloody fleece from the second hand uniform stall and obviously if I'd deliberately stolen it I'd have cut her kids name off

See I don't understand this. Back in my day the older kids would be tasked to sort the lost property out at the end of term and named garments would be given to their owners.

Not sure about DS's school as it was a SN school. He regularly left coats behind so I'd ask if he could look at break or he would be wearing a bin bag. "Can he look at break" being code for will someone find it for him as he could be standing on it and not notice it!!

Unashamedly here for the next installment.

Great story!

But I agree with a pp - my (admittedly scatty) son’s clearly labelled jumpers etc often seem to be in the lost property box.

he could be standing on it and not notice it!!

So could my Ds!

I hope Ms Label Checker doesn't get it into her head to do the sniff test.
Actually it would be quite funny

Brought back a plimsoll moment to me. KS1 class, bright mathematicians group had an extension task and deduced the formula for area of a quadrilateral all by themselves from working with squared paper shapes using their x tables facts unprompted. I reminded the class at home-time to tell what they learned today, not what they'd "done", as I always did. I saw Mrs Bright-Mathematician turn back with her son and foolishly awaited acknowledgement.

"He's lost his plimsolls, Mrs Newly! And the bag they were in! I can't afford another pair! You need to find them!" Cue Mrs Newly deflating like a sad, wrinkly balloon. "Was his name on them?" Was it heck as like.

Several more hectoring after-school visits followed with me being lectured about how rubbish I was at looking after children's belongings and her pulling everything about to no avail. He wore the spare plimsolls for a few PE lessons until suddenly, one Monday, there he was with bag and plimsolls happily changing.

Where had they turned up? Under the stairs at home. Did I get an apology? Did I heck as like. I wrote his name in them, though.

I don't blame her to an extent. When you have to buy costly replacements constantly because clothes are being stolen- accidentally initially by the kid and then deliberately when the parents fail to return it, I can imagine it starts to get really frustrating. When the school continually fails to step in and check for you, there is a point where I'm sure most parents would love to do what this parent did. I could t afford 6 jumpers in a year, if they are not in lost property they are being taken home by other children and then kept by selfish parents.

The group changing rooms when I used to take Y3 swimming would make me tear my hair out. There was always one child who couldn't find their underwear/jumper/coat or whatever when it was time to get dressed. The worst was when one poor child couldn't find his trousers. I made everyone turn out their bags, searched under the benches, everywhere I could think of. The child was getting tearful and I was pondering just how I could get him back to school trouserless when I spotted Amir wearing trousers so big he had to hold them up when he walked, otherwise they would fall down. Yes, they were the missing trousers. When asked if he had noticed that they weren't his trousers, Amir simply said yes, he had. "So why did you put them on?" I asked. "Because they were on my peg" was the logical answer. Can't argue with that! Amir's trousers, by the way, turned up in the toilets.

Parents are weird. DS2 was a habitual jumper misplacer - actually less misplaced and more "left somewhere at school". Majority were in locker, a few in lost property. Did a weekly gather up from the locker and an occasional hunt through lost property. Fortunately we had a fabulously priced second hand stall so I just bought loads of second hand jumpers.

@DeepaBeesKit

Doesnt anyone sew in labels properly any more?

I do. Not a single item of uniform lost [SMUG!!].

We do. Seen in labels, and an ink stamp. DS left his jumper behind on the first day of reception, and on the second day he came home with a different size jumper with his name written in it in marker pen. I have no idea where the original went but we have kept the mystery jumper.

Please write a book OP, it's your true calling.

I've even thought of a name for it -

"Mrs Label checker can shove her PTA up her (lost) jumper"

Lovely to read this clever and descriptive piece of writing. !

@Wilkolampshade - I think we may have worked together as my TA had this skill! What an asset your were to me and the whole school. Nose like a bloodhound!

I'm very intrigued by the jumper smelling!

I've never understood why primary schools can't return named lost property to kids. They manage to do it at secondary school where there are a 1000+ kids so why not primary? Especially during covid when parents aren't allowed in school to look through lost property.

"The cutesy prose was distracting but I get the idea. From the fact that you have everyone’s (changed I would hope) names it sounds like you think there was a racial element to Mrs LC’s attitude. That makes it even worse"

I have changed names but don't think there was a racial element to Ms. Label Checker. She was trying to pick off anyone she could to be honest, Ahmed just happened to be walking her.

Ahmed was followed by Meghan Reece and Saeed. He was just the first! I hope there wasn't a racial element

I always used a sharpie on the label of all ds school uniform & if anything had 2 labels it got his name on twice. I used to put his name inside the pockets of his school coat so it couldn't be cut out.

@Pennguin

I'm very intrigued by the jumper smelling!

I've never understood why primary schools can't return named lost property to kids. They manage to do it at secondary school where there are a 1000+ kids so why not primary? Especially during covid when parents aren't allowed in school to look through lost property.

I've never known a secondary school return lost property, but if they do it's likely because they have specific pastoral staff whose role it is. In primary school, the class teacher does all things and there's no time for them to go sifting through lost property searching for names they recognise on top of everything else they do.