I have to provide FOUR different costumes in 7 days for junior school! Irritated!

[miljee]

DS1, 8, is in year 4. Last week he brought home a flyer announcing that tomorrow he has to go into school dressed as someone careerwise he'd like to be when he grows up- so can't wheel out the old pirate suit here!- He didn't want 'doctor' which would have been easier for me but a bit 'predictable', perhaps- he wanted 'ICT tech' Wot? I suggested he didn't wash for the week (ha ha, said my ICT tech DH.) BUT at least we can come up with a defunct laptop, network cable, round-the-neck ID pass and a pocketful of biros. THEN DS1 comes home 2 days ago with a flyer saying he has to go to school dressed like an Egyptian next Thursday. That'd be towards the end of Nov, so clothing appropriate to the people of the Kingdoms of the Upper Nile and the Lower Nile might cause hypothermia in an English schoolboy in winter. THEN yesterday, lo! TWO costumes for the school production- to be in school by next Friday. We have 'all-in-black'- BIT of a pain, finding a plain, long-sleeved T shirt for a child in BLACK, BUT the piece de resistance, the other is a 1970 disco outfit complete with flares, big collar, afro wig, spangly waistcoat. WHERE am I going to source THAT? DO the school not realise each costume can take a mum a day to pull together once you've FOUND the raw materials? And that with 2 days off work a week, XMAS well on its way AND 2 insets and a polling day school closure coming up I have NO TIME?

I am actually quite stressed about it!

That does seem like a lot at once. Poor you. And I thought I had it bad last night sewing felt spots on a white t-shirt for Children in Need. In a moment of insanity I offered to do one for 3yo DD who doesn't go to nursery on a Friday as well. Fortunately she declined the offer and wants to wear spotty tights. Led to a slight argument because I had thrown her only spotty tights away due to them having a gaping hole in the knee. So I am off tights shopping in my lunch hour.

On a more practical note - could you die some clothes black?

YANBU Milijee

that's an awful lot of "creative" stuff or expense if you hire/buy bits! Sounds like the different themed days/plays haven't been co-ordinated terribly well. Why not have a word with te class teacher & say fiirmly you'll do what you can but as a working mum you can't pull that sort of stuff together.

I stated firmly at the begining of each school year that I was NOT a Blue Peter mother plus I work FT, so if they wanted anything remotely creative they'd have to do it themselves! I was always happy to get plain/coloured t-shirts/tights/accessories but otherwise no. I did try & make myself available to help in other ways so they wouldn't feel I was being stroppy.At the end of the year (having had all year to source it!) I tried to donate a dressing up costume of the simple shepherd/eggyptian variety for their stock for the next mum like me!

We all have our strengths & weaknesses & we can't beat ourselves up about it- motherhood is stressy enough!!

YANBU. I'm just plain incompetent, and don't see why I should waste my time with such things. I'd probably have suggested "spy", looking completely inconspicuous in school uniform, as a career of convenience. My children have to make do with things they can make themselves out of cardboard (Pharaoh's crown maybe?).

Dye - what has happened to my spelling this week?

i would write a letter of complaint to the school - the unthoughfulness of schools gets me OISTING - we dont all have one child - y'know

do a project and a presentation on Aundel cathedral they said. you have to use props they said. it has to be preented to the class they said, it has to be ten minutes they said. but i have twins you feckers - try making two different ones.

so my rant over - completely with you on this you should complain.

egyptian costume this time of year - are they dense?

Thanks everyone. I feel better! I laughed at the Blue Peter mum concept and the idea of sending him in as a spy! I guess I get wound up because my DS isn't overly confident and would sooner die than stand out from a crowd so as a Modern Helicopter Mummy who feels the needs to Micro-Manage every aspect of my child's life in order to guarantee his eternal happiness....no, not really but in the 'blue-abdomened fly' atmosphere of modern life one can so easily believe that somehow one is letting one's child down if he's not in a really well thought out and expertly assembled costume! I have to laugh when I consider my own childhood- like most people's, it was a dressing gown and a tea towel. Voila! A shepherd.

For the Egypt shenanigan I shall buy a white Primark outsized T shirt, and a metre of glittery gold fabric to make a belt and head dress; we do have a black shirt with white half sleeves- THAT WILL DO! I shall find a nasty tie in a charity shop which will double as tomorrow's ICT tech and the 70's disco gear. It can be done.

And yes, I believe I will write a short note suggesting their requests, whilst 'fun' and perhaps 'spur of the moment' are rather unreasonable. I have already spent and entire evening with a tired child making giant flash cards with Japanese 1-10 on them for TODAY's project which is to 'teach the class something new'- but, tbh, perhaps that's more worthwhile in terms of our time than endless bleddy costume design!

Definitely complain - it is unreasonable.

But of course - the assumption at primary schools is that mummies have nothing else to do all day but make costumes/cakes/research projects/do endless errands to the library etc etc. The fact that you may have more than one child, elderly relatives to look after or - heaven forbid - a job, doesn't enter their heads.

Does anyone else crouch down behind the wall when the empty cake boxes are being handed out? (Dcs saying loudly..."ooh, mummy, are we playing hide and seek?")

No 3LF but I do cringe when I bring in my (yet again) shop bought cake & put it down as an offering next to all the scrummy home made one!!!

But it is a FARM SHOP cake so that's almost homemade....just not in my home!

This is inconsiderate of your school and I would have a polite word with them. I think some teachers only get the point when they themselves have young children and receive the same kind of requests while they're trying to hold down their own jobs.

I believe that is part of the problem- you have no CONCEPT of how your time gets eaten away til you are actually a mother yourself. It's literally inconceivable! How I chortle at the young women at work who can't wait to get pregnant and go on maternity leave for all that scrummy 'time off'. HA! The differences are, I tell 'em at least you get PAID here and, sooner or later, you'll get a tea break.

I laughed at the 'empty cake box' scenario. I don't make or buy any cakes- I give 4-5 hours of my time, twice a year to run the tea shoppe at the fairs, a stressful and manic activity. That's enough I figure!

And a farm shop bought one is JUST like home-made!

Anyway, I duly gave up 4 hours of my Sunday constructing an Egyptian outfit. At least I won't have to do it again 2 years hence when DS2 is at that school! I'm just awaiting the slip in HIS bookbag telling me he has to be dressed as an fully functional animatronic camel for HIS Nativity!

The local charity shops are always full at this time of year of wild-eyed mums hoping to find a full bird of paradise/gnu/anteater or whatever costume. In their child's size.

I actually punched the air a few months ago when I was trawling dispiritedly through Oxfam etc looking for a Zambian costume and then, lo and behold, a Winnie Mandela-type top and skirt in Help the Aged - for £2.99!

Schools somehow assume that everyone has a full array of outfits worthy of a theatrical costumiers up in the loft.

I went to a 'Fabric Land' store last week to amass the raw materials and I swear that every woman there was buying up stuff for nativity plays/Xmas ballet recitals etc! Endless half metres of glitzy fabric!

some £5 off the peg jobs here

at your post miljee- I can see it now!!

Have often thought there must be a market for a warehouse type store that just does rails of basic t-shirts/leggings/capes etc in all the colours & all the sizes with a huge range of accessories /glittery bits/masks that you could mix or match to get your required costume.

It would have an area linked to the National Curriculum as well with an Egyptian/Tudor/Viking /whatever is trendy to learn about this year selection too!!

sigh

maybe one day!!