Missed memo: ‘I forgot to pick up my daughter from school’

Mariska (30), mother of Maya (11) and Feline (9): “Which mother is late for her child’s swim? Well, me, at Feline’s C degree. I hadn’t checked, but assumed that they used the same times for C as before for A and B: Saturday afternoon two hours. Not so. The moment we arrived in full uniform, with grandparents who live eighty kilometers away, the whole party turned out to be over. super snow. I immediately arranged that she could still swim that Monday morning, just before school and that my best friend came as an audience. Then we went to breakfast together. Still, Feline was inconsolable. She is now in gymnastics and I check the competition times a hundred times. This will never happen to me again.”

scattered

Pascalle (34), mother of Mitchell (11) and Mees (6): “One time is already pretty stupid, but coming to the parent meetings a second time on the wrong night is downright clumsy. You can therefore best characterize my motherhood as ‘absent-minded’. I often put appointments in the calendar from the Parent Portal or the group app, but I don’t look at them anymore because I think I remember the correct date. This regularly results in crazy actions, such as being ready at seven for a football match while there is a winter break. Or discover on Friday that it is autumn break the following week and I therefore have to change my working week. Or show up twice at the wrong time for the ten-minute conversation. The first time at the beginning of the school year I was a week early, the last time in June I was at the schoolyard two days earlier than planned. Both times I had also drummed up my ex, who was understandably there not amused left.”

Goosebumps Day

Nienke (40), mother of Jeroen (12) and Charlotte (10): “Usually in the winter it is very warm in the classroom, so I delivered my children as usual in a thin shirt. But our environmentally conscious school has a Warm Sweater Day once in a while; then the thermostat goes down to fifteen degrees. And that was then. They were shivering in school that day because Mama had missed the memo about the warm sweaters. I really don’t remember if that was a note in the bag or one of the fifteen million emails you get with unclear newsletters in the attachment, but I clearly hadn’t read it.”

There goes my morning

Anita (45), mother of Ruben (12) and Stijn (9): “I had a slow morning, didn’t have to go to work and didn’t feel like getting dressed before taking the kids to school. I put on a jacket over my sleep shirt and sweatpants and got into the car. I wasn’t even wearing underwear. Arriving at school, Stijn suddenly said enthusiastically: ‘You are going to the walk-in morning, aren’t you, mom?’ Totally forgotten. School has drop-in moments a few times a year; half an hour in which parents can experience what it is like in the classroom. Children receive a special language or math lesson or hold a quiz for the parents. Of course I could have said no, but I knew how disappointed Stijn would be. So there was nothing for it but to go inside. And ask the teacher if I didn’t want to take off my coat after all.”

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You will pay for that

Dineke (27), mother of Marissa (9), Amélie (5) and pregnant with a son: “I had neatly copied the date of the study day from the email onto the calendar, but I never looked at it again. And so I just sent my daughter to school that Friday. Half the village saw her cycling with her backpack and before she even got to school, I had received dozens of text messages asking if I hadn’t forgotten something. Meanwhile, Marissa stood for a while waiting for her teacher and class in an otherwise deserted schoolyard. Coincidentally, a boy passed by and told me dryly that the school was closed. I got a grumpy girl at home and that didn’t go away that day. Angry that I had let her cycle to school for nothing.”

oops

Deborah (47), mother of Job (16), Luuk (14) and Ciske (11): “With three children at different schools, it is always a bit of juggling to have every child show up on time in the right clothes and with the necessary materials.

Once that went terribly wrong and I mixed up all the tasks. For example, child 1 had the glass jar from child 2’s assignment, child 2 had the sock that was needed for child 3’s craft assignment, and child 3 had the homework of child 1. So Ciske could not make a hand puppet without a sock. Instead, his brother’s math was in his high school bag, a 15-minute bike ride away. Luuk was in an outbuilding and was given a sock, but just needed a glass jar to make a light. And when Job was asked where his homework was, he replied in astonishment, “I don’t know, sir, but I do have a glass jar in my backpack!” The teacher laughed out loud. ah, story of my life. I’m on my own and a lava flow comes in every day with emails about study days and free hours.

By the way, I also sometimes e-mailed the math teacher in high spirits, because he had marked an ‘absent’ in Magister as unauthorized, while I had properly unsubscribed my son. Turns out I had emailed my other son’s teacher. Different school, same last name. My response was, ‘I don’t teach math at all, ma’am.’”

Forget

Karin (42), mother of Sarah (9): “Unsuspectingly, I arrived at school just before three, after a nice day of shopping. It was strange that the whole schoolyard was empty. And there was no child or parent to be seen inside either. Just a concierge who looked strange when he saw me. Didn’t I know it was margin afternoon? After 12 o’clock all the children had been free, the newsletter had stated. oops. Coincidentally, I forgot my cell phone that day and no one had my husband’s number. Once at home I turned out to have 24 missed calls and ditto apps and texts. Fortunately, a stay-at-home mother had brought Sarah along. She had messaged and left me several times. I was ashamed, my daughter found the unexpected outing very pleasant.”

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