Elementary School for Parents?

You go to pick up your young child from school, and as you watch him approaching you with a smile on your face, suddenly you notice something different.  Is it that....oh, no, it can't be - your smile begins to fade - but yes, you see that your child has another backpack, and is happily clutching a bear.

I dread that darn bear.  You know the one.  He is YOUR homework.  You, the parent.  Not your child, who loves the bear and is ready to play with it for the next day or so.  When we had just gotten into our van, my son was already holding the bear up in the air, yelling:  "The adventure begins!!" 

For who, is the question?  I'll show you an adventure!  That !@#$%^ bear just adds to my already overwhelming workload.  My young son is supposed to do a journal entry.  But who is going to help him do his letters and spell correctly?  Not the bear!  And who is going to take the pictures for the journal and print them out, suddenly realizing that you're out of computer paper and must run to the store late at night in a snowstorm just to finish your son's homework?  That's right.  You.

I thought that bear was trouble enough.  But now one of my children is learning about pioneers.  He's going on a field trip, and not only do I have to dress him in period clothing (luckily I have some gray flannel trousers and suspenders hanging in my closet...or, no, sorry, that's not me, because I live in the 21rst century!) but I have to bake period food for him to take with him in his lunch pail with no Tupperware or anything.  Oh, yes, and I have to bake the cornmeal biscuits over a fire pit in the woods in a big black antique pot, in the middle of winter, also dressed in a gingham dress and an apron.  I can't wait!  But I'm not bitter or anything.  Do I sound bitter?

Anyway, it's my own fault.  Because I take up the challenge of the visiting bear and the pioneer day.  I do the journal entries and the pictures.  I baked the cornbread biscuits and packed milk in a glass jar.  And I dragged out 'pioneer-like' clothes.  I did it....and now I'm going to take a nap!