My Apologies to the Mom who Thought I Made that Costume

Last night was a disaster. Today is “Dress Like Your Favorite Book Character” Day at school and it ends with a book parade where the kids show each other their costumes. For years I have successfully avoided any interaction with this event because my oldest two genuinely didn’t care. I told them if they wanted to come up with a costume themselves, I’d be fine with that, but I was not going to do it for them. Nobody wanted to put in the effort, so year after year this has been a non-issue, along with every other school dress-up day that involves something beyond what they already have in their closets.

But not last night.

My daughter really wanted to participate. She really wanted to have a costume that would make her feel special. We do not own anything that she wanted to wear and I did not have the skills or finances necessary to come up with something she deemed acceptable.

She cried. A lot. She does that sometimes. She told me about what all her friends were doing and how left out she felt every year. Her older brothers tried to console her with how they never participated and it wasn’t a big deal, but it was A BIG DEAL to her and nobody was going to convince her otherwise. I left my sobbing daughter who told me she just needed “some alone time” to calm down and felt steam coming out of my ears about this whole situation. The mom guilt was overwhelming.

I know some moms really excel at this kind of stuff and find so much joy in it. I am not that mom. My kids have lame Valentine boxes, their dioramas and science fair projects were clearly made by THEM and not by a Pinterest-inspired parent, and dress-up days are always a bust. Generally my kids have grace for me and my mom failings, but I hate when I feel like they carry the burden of my lack of skills. . . or money that would overcome my lack of skills.

I told my daughter I was 100% sure her principal and teachers did not want her to feel stressed about this. They didn’t give her this optional assignment so she would feel left out and be crying herself to sleep the night before. They didn’t intend for us to spend money we don’t have to try and make it work. But still she struggled and I struggled with feeling frustrated that this burden gets put on those of us who are already stretched pretty thin.

And then I mindlessly scrolled Facebook and saw this adorable picture of my son on his school’s page:

Yes. That is my son in an elaborate costume that clearly looks homemade in all the best ways. 

I asked him about it and he told me the teacher had asked for volunteers to wear it for a picture and he had raised his hand. But all I could imagine was some other mom like me, mindlessly scrolling Facebook as she dealt with her own emotional fallout from consoling a distraught daughter over school dress-up day. I could imagine how deflated she would feel if she imagined I had created that costume and my kid would be wearing it in the book parade the next day.

For the moms that love these events, I salute you. I see your hard work and I value it. I’m honestly glad you can do these things for your kids and they truly look adorable. But for fellow moms like me, I apologize for this picture. If you know our family, you know we have six kids and I am famously not crafty. I did not make that costume. I don’t make any costumes. Do not let this picture make you feel bad about whatever your capacity is. Don’t let your kids use it as leverage against you. Don’t let it contribute to a moment of mom guilt about whatever cobbled together Harry Potter or Junie B. Jones situation you put together at the last minute this morning.

I love our public school. I love the teachers and administrators. I love that they want to cultivate a love of reading in our kids through events like these. I’m not asking them to change just to make my life easier. I’m just trusting that my kids are learning important lessons as they take ownership of their projects, learn to give their mother grace, and recognize that sometimes you can’t get what you want. . . especially when you ask the night before.