Don't Let the Flowers Fool Ya

If you've got school-aged kids, or are a teacher yourself, I'm sure you're aware that this was Teacher Appreciation Week.

I appreciate my sons' teachers immensely. Of course I do. After all, they take the kids off my hands every day are responsible for much of the kids' education. They put up with quirks that make even me grind my teeth. And they do it with a smile, while simultaneously dealing with twenty other quirky kids: something I could never, ever, ever, ever, ever - did I mention ever? - do. (And while being underpaid to do it? No thanks.)

Teachers, man. They're practically saints.

So last Friday we got a piece of paper from the school saying that for Teacher Appreciation Week, the kids should bring one item each day. Monday was candy. Tuesday was fruit. Wednesday was a handmade card. Thursday was office supplies. And today - Friday - was a flower.

Despite my mad pinning of cutesy crafty things on Pinterest, there was no actual cutesy craftiness going on up in here. Because Curtis was out of town all week and it was all I could do to feed and dress and bathe and clothe and attend to homework and such all by myself ... let alone do anything extra-fancy for the kids' teachers. If circumstances had been different, perhaps the big bags of Rolos I sent on Monday would have had, say, an adorable little card saying something like "You're On a Roll-O" or at least "Thanks for Putting Up With My Kid." Or the apples I sent on Tuesday would have had, like, ribbons tied around the stems.

But ... no.

This has been such a hectic week that I forgot, until this morning, that today was bring-a-flower day. Because, you see, it's also Beach Day in Colin's class and I was busy scraping together an outfit that's a.) beachy but b.) also works when it's fifty degrees and rainy because that's how it is today. And locating his sunglasses and a beach towel which was, for some reason, crammed inside the caddy that carries all my vacuum attachments. (WTF?) Anyway, that pretty much took up all of my mom-brain capacity this morning.

So when Cameron was like, "Hey Mommy! What's today's Teacher Appreciation gift?" and looked at me all eagerly, I was like, "........??" *blink blink*

Flowers. Must find flowers. 

Since it's spring, you'd think flowers would be easy to come by. But the flowers in my flowerbed aren't blooming yet because the weather has been a real asshole. I did swipe a few lovely sprigs of lilac from the park the other day (hey, it was a big bush, there were plenty), but they've long since withered.

Then my eyes fell on the bouquet on my kitchen table.

Weeks ago - I'm talking almost a month - Curtis went to the store one Saturday morning to pick up some ingredients for French toast, and he came back with a sweet little bouquet of brightly dyed flowers for me. To show you, and give you an idea of just how long these suckas have lasted, here's a picture of them from back when I wrote the play-dough post. Remember that? Yeah, these are some old flowers.

Unlike me, they look good for their age.

Anyway, the paper from school didn't say "bring your teacher a huge fancy bouquet of flowers." It simply said, "Flower." Indicating one single flower. So I grabbed my bouquet and picked out the freshest of the bunch. They were beginning to brown and curl a little bit on the underside, so I trimmed off the older petals. Good as new! ... Practically. For Colin's teacher, there was a big purple-and-pink bloom. It was like four inches across. For Cameron's teacher, three blue-and-white daisies.

So I shuttled them off to school. And when I pulled up in the dropoff lane, there were tons of other kids bringing flowers too.

Bouquets of flowers.

Big bouquets of flowers.

With ribbons. 

Curly ribbons.

And fancy tissue paper.

Probably no one else's kid brought used, month-old, single flowers that their mom trimmed the dead parts off of.

But hey ... I suppose it's better than nothing, right?

(Which is, coincidentally, what I sent yesterday because I wasn't going to drag four kids into the store to buy office supplies. Ugh. I'm such a horrible failure as a conscientious parent sometimes.)

I hope the boys' teachers know that despite the barrage of crappy gifts I've sent this week, we do appreciate them. Like, a lot. And that it's really the thought that counts. And that I was acting as a single parent this week and I'm losing my mind and I'm just not crafty and creative, dammit.

Maybe I'll write them a poem.