Are You Parent Enough For This?

I was pretty sure that once I had kids the only homework I would need to worry about would include a quick question about fractions or making sure they were reading their designated 20 minutes per day. Wrong. Homework, I have concluded, is just another way for teachers to judge your parenting abilities. Because apparently Parent Teacher Conferences aren't enough abuse.

Last week, I realized that my youngest had a homework project due in five days that we had yet to even start. Plenty of time you say? Why worry, you say? Well, here is why worry. There is no seven year old on the planet who can stay focused on such a tedious project for longer than seventeen minutes. This project claimed to teach the kids how to count to one thousand by forcing them to glue 1,000 random items, that you have hanging around your house, onto a poster board. Easy enough? No. One hundred sets of ten is not easy and it takes a high capacity hot glue gun, which a second grader cannot use alone, to keep these little pieces of shit from falling off every two minutes.

 The first two hundred items were fun and we were all excited for the treasure hunt that ensued. Mini stickers, bow tie pasta and colored feathers from Grandma's endless selection of randomness. Then the fun ended. Mr. 7 was ready to move onto a snack and I was ready to move out of the house and burn the poster sitting on the counter. After hours of gluing and fingertips that were singed beyond recognition, we had 700 items. I wanted to cry. Could I glue tampons to it? Would anyone care if we put hypodermic needles next to the dry pinto beans? I did sink pretty low in regards to good judgement and glued on some of my husband's used test strips from his diabetic testing machine. I hope no one tries to lick that side of the poster.

I was at my wits end and leaving for yoga when I realized that we still needed two hundred more items before the next morning at 9 am. Without crying, I begged my husband to help Mr. 7 find some more crap to glue on while I was gone. Otherwise, I would never come back. Upon returning I found a nearly finished poster complete with dog food, fish crackers, pennies and cold cereal. I was almost in tears. We finished up in time to prove our worth as parents and I said a little prayer of thanks for the fact that we would not have another child who would attend second grade. Hey public school....bring on the next parenting experiment, we are ready for you, bitches.