All things fun, I mean dumb, I mean fun, I mean...

I made it to the Hollidazzle Parade event at school last night. So fun. Not. Events like this are planned for to bring the kids and their families together for a social gathering, to build a sense of community and spirit. It just doesn't work for families like ours. If they didn't pump it up so much and get the kids so excited for it, we wouldn't go. We do skip a ton of the activities, and sometimes I feel like we owe it to the other kids to make an effort.

They had raffle tickets for sale. No room in our budget to buy any tickets. Kids could fill out one free ticket if they answered some questions right on a holiday quiz sheet. There were probably 15 questions, I only knew the answer to one. Akila was furious. Obsessed. It was not fun. An activity that was meant to be fun, and was for 99.9% of the kids there, was a nightmare. I finally started sending out mass texts to friends asking questions like "what was the name of the rabbit in Frosty the Snowman". My brain was totally dead, and I haven't seen any holiday shows this year. Thankfully, several friends answered and we got Hocus Pocus right. Thanks friends!

So eventually she got the three answers and turned it in and got to put her name on a raffle ticket. They had a couple of little baskets with junk in them, and an Ipod. The free tickets were not valid for the Ipod drawing, just the baskets. Then, Akila wanted to show the kids her honor roll certificate. I told her that mom and dad brought it home. She disagreed. Adamantly. More than once. Then talked a staff into bringing her up to her locker to get it. I went to the bathroom. The raffle ticket drawing happened during this time.

Akila won a basket. I should have known, she always wins stuff. The basket had a chocolate bar in it, a pack of hot chocolate, and a few coffee packets. A mom and her two kids were sitting a the table with us, very nice family. The son is in Zeke's class, and the daughter is in Imani's grade. That daughter happened to win the Ipod. When Akila came back and the kids told her she won the basket, she was mad as she wanted to win the Ipod. Of course.

I had told that mom I wasn't even entering the drawing for the Ipod as it would only cause major problems as to who would get it (plus I didn't have money in the budget). When Akila saw that this girl at our table won it, she became obsessed. She asked the girl if she would trade the Ipod for her basket. The girl laughed, it was funny after all. Not to Akila. She was serious. She doesn't see the difference in value, although she desperately wants the Ipod.

So, the rest of the event, was not fun. I was thinking the entire time, why did we come? Why do I do this to myself? The little boy in this family wanted to stay with Zeke at the parade and the mom said we would walk together. This ticked Akila off as she now hated the Ipod girl with a passion. We started to walk to the parade, and Akila was furious and jealous that Imani was walking with the Ipod girl. At the parade, all Akila could do was yell at the kids for anything she perceived they were doing that was wrong.

I just hate how all things fun like this event, almost always turn into a disaster. The good thing though, is that the other 3 kids had fun despite her issues. They are pretty good at ignoring and looking past her behaviors. Driving home, she was talking about what a horrible day it was. This made me chuckle, inside of course. She had the honor roll ceremony in the morning, and in her after school class, she had completed making a boombox out of a lunchbox. It is super cool, it has a speaker in it, and an MP3 player attached to it. The kids got to solder it together and do the wiring. She got to go to the parade. But she didn't win the Ipod and that is what ruined her day. It kind of ruined mine too. But I'll get over it. I am still so thankful that she is home, and not violent. Thank you Jesus!