"Have Zeke write his phone number on this piece of paper," I told Kellen early last week, pointing to a yellow post-it note strategically tacked to the front of his school folder.
My son came home from school that afternoon professing success. "Zeke wrote his number down! Can we call him right now?"
A quick glance at the post-it note alerted me to the fact that Zeke was not in my family's calling plan.
"Where does Zeke live?" I asked my son. "Malaysia?"
The next day, I tried a different approach.
"Give this to Zeke and tell him to take it home," I said, stuffing an envelope containing my contact information and a note to Zeke's mother into my son's backpack.
Three days passed before I received a response.
"Here you go!" Kellen said triumphantly as he handed me a sealed envelope. "I found this in my backpack. It's probably from Zeke's mom." He waited expectantly as I opened the envelope and inspected its contents.
"There's Zeke's phone number! There it is!" he yelled and began dancing around the kitchen.
His excitement was tempered by the revelation that the phone number to which he was pointing was in fact his own...and was written in my handwriting.
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Ugh. We don't give out our phone number any more... not since my eldest's first grade year. One of the kids in her class would call as early as 6am on the weekends, or as late as 10pm at night. My husband was working nights and sleeping days, and it wasn't until she called and woke him up three times in one morning - *after* school started on a weekday, mind you - that he succeeded in getting the message across that she should never call again.
Oh, I can so relate to this story. My 4-year-old started Pre-K this year and has already asked if she can spend the night (or have other little girls in her class spend the night with her) or if she "can get their numbers" so she can call them. I'm not a big fan of just handing out my telephone number, so I have just casually changed the subject when this has been brought up. So far, so good! I know the day is coming when this conversation won't go in MY favor.
Ah, we've done this, too. Although, now that my eldest is in Middle School, she comes home with a post-it full of numbers. The child's cell, the mom's home, the dad's home, the mom's cell, the grandma's home, the grandma's cell, and I'm never sure where to begin!
Our school has a voluntary class friendship list with adresses and phone numbers.
The school prohibits in class distribution of party invitations.
The princess is not allowed to use the phone and I keep the ringer off when I don't want to be disturbed.
When my son was about five he announced he was going to call Michael Jordan. With a huge, expectant smile, he picked up the phone and pressed 23.
Oh no! Poor guy-- we give out directories to people who ask for them, otherwise they aren't distributed either. People are offered the chance to not have their info put in-- as teachers, we can get it, but parents can't. I hope the boys get their playdate eventually!
This is so funny!! Thanks, Jana.
You live at our house and you're stealing our family moments, I know it! Where are you, in a wall somewhere???
ROTFL
This is great. My kindergartner has better handwriting than I do but I think this scenario (or something very similar) happened with my daughter. XD
You just have to LOVE their excitement!! Kids are so funny. It is great to see their little minds work. . . . my daughters are all grown up. My last is 12 yrs. I did day care in my home for several children and loved it. I think God grants us a special glimps of His humor thru children.
I thought you lived much further away from me than you do...we are in Utah, but we must not. A lot of my kid's friends have that same 12-15 digit phone number.
Our school does voluntary directories. Depending on the teacher, it might only be an email address, but it's more reliable than the contact info a young one comes home with.
Since moving 3 times the year my oldest was in Kindergarten, we ordered FREE business cards from vistaprint.com. We use them for our contact information--comes in handy for Church, school, and neighbors. More reliable than a post-it note, I've found.
We went through this. It took 3 months before my information made it to the other boys Mom and she was able to call back.
Thanks for a good laugh. I needed that. :)
I had a very similar situation with my son giving me our phone number that I wrote down a week and half earlier for him to give to Jacob.
A parent in my daughter's third grade class asked the teacher if she could put together a phone directly and the teacher was fine with it. We received the request and happily filled it out, our cell and house numbers as well my email address. What a BIG mistake! Talk about getting phone calls from parents asking if my daughter copied down the homework assignements, if my daughter understood the assignment and my daughter calling her classmates to chit chat. Well, I sure learned my lesson!
I could have written this post myself, we have done this so many times! I'm thinking of getting those "Mom Cards" and just handing them to other moms when I come accross them at school functions. But that doesn't help the begging and pleading to visit the mystery "best friend" whose parents I can never track down. Blah!
Loved this - completely hit home with me. Nearly, the same experience I had. Too funny.
so funny... that has happened to me as well.. my daughter is always wanting to get together with friends.. but since i have a 2 year old as well and babies are strickly forbidden from school apparently i know NONE of the moms. And notes from parents to other parents are forbidden too. There is no note sending allowed through kids at school... not really sure how my daughter is supposed to have friends. I'm glad she is not on the phone all the time or asking to call anyone.
Find out Zeke's last name.
And pray it isn't Smith. ;)
Well, at least the numbers are clear....half the numbers my son has brought home are illegible. :)
Next comes the mass of handwritten invitations that your child makes and hands out at school - then when the friends start showing up and wondering what we are doing for the party (what party?) I am really the worst play-date mom ever.
Fortunately, now that my oldest two are in 5th and 3rd grade, we have it figured out, and they know what I will and won't tolerate. I'm a really mean mom.
LOL! I received a simlar note in my son's backpack!
ROFLOL - poor kid. Your just going to have to go into school and meet this Zeke and hope his mom picks him up from school, so you can introduce yourself and get the ball rolling.
Wow, how did our Mother's cope?? The school directory, in the 'old' days (a few years ago) was a valuable tool for Mom's to arrange get togethers and parties of all types...it was not meant to be in the hands of 5-10 year olds...it's quite simple really..just say NO! Does anyone actually do that anymore??
What 'privacy' issues, exactly? (can you tell I'm frustrated? ;-)
I laughed so hard at that post-it pic I had tears in my eyes!
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