My All-Star Motivational Skills

Within 5.4 seconds of your first child entering high school, you quickly learn that everything, ev-re-thing!, has a fee and fundraiser that's required. College funds (if you're the kind of good parents that actually have those) evaporate into the endless checks you write for your teenagers and their high school activities. Someone should have warned me that I would need a part-time job just to cover it all.

After Child #1 was welcomed (cheers, balloons, excitement!) into the National Honors Society, the students were told about the mandatory fundraiser and monetary fees. So clearly, if you're a smart and hard working student, you have to pay for that right. Am I reading that clearly? (I'm no where near NHS material, so maybe I'm looking at it all wrong. It's highly possible.)

And can we note, just for fun, that's it's the end of the school year. Asking a parent for money at this point in the game is a dangerous thing to do. Oh yes, yes it is.

Yesterday, #1 comes stomping in the door and exclaims:
"If NHS didn't look good on a college resume, I would quit!!!!!!"

She stands and stares at me, while I'm folding HER laundry, so I exclaim:
"If motherhood didn't look good on a heaven resume, I would quit!!!!"

{pause for effect....I open my eyes even wider and really stare her down....}

"Now suck it up and stop complaining."


Amen. End of story.
Feel free to take notes on my teenager mothering skills.

Oh, and my pantry is stocked with fruit snacks now. You know, the fundraiser fruit snacks she was supposed to sell to other people. I bought 24. Again, take notes on the awesomeness (which is sometimes interchangeable with stupidity).