I had an interesting thing happen today which caused my baser instinct to come roaring through my otherwise gentile personality. Ahem. What?<\/p>\n

My daughter, Avery, is in the first grade and attends public school. Every morning I pick out her clothes because if her daily ensemble were up to her she’d probably wear her ripped jeans and skip the shirt altogether. That child is one Busch Light away from full-on Redneck. To Avery, a shirt is strictly something you should only have to wear whenin public. Otherwise, it’s just in the way. This theory works for you when your chest indents. However, about two minutes after puberty sets in it’s not such aneasy look to pull off. Realistically, I see full-time shirts in her not-so distantfuture.<\/p>\n

This morning I woke Avery up and set outa jean skirt anda white long sleeveshirt to layer under her redschool t-shirt. Now, my girl does like to, what she considers “dress up”, in a jean skirt. She struts her stuff around the house, kicking up her heels like a rodeo princess. This morning was no exception. She looked very ‘schoolgirl’ with her white tennis shoes and bobby socks.<\/p>\n

I sent her off to school without a second thought and began my day of singularly saving Jack’s life a bare minimum of 40 different times. That kid is some kind of crazy. His trick du’jour this morning was to launch himself off the coffee table a’la Evil Knievel but without the fancy pantsuit and helmet.<\/p>\n

Right after lunch (a nutritious Nutella and Goldfish cracker sandwich – Jack’s concoction, not mine) I got a phone call.<\/p>\n

“Hello?” I answered.<\/p>\n

“Mindy? Hi, it’s *so and so* from the school. Avery is wearing an adorable little mini skirt at school today and we’re a bit concerned that it’s a little too short. Might you be able to drop by something new for her to wear?”<\/p>\n

What?!? <\/em>Okay, I distinctly remember dressing that child and I’m pretty sure she was not wearing a tiny little mini skirt.<\/em> In fact, if my memory serves, she was wearing a jean skirt which fell approximately 1 1\/2 inches above her knee.<\/p>\n

Scandalous!<\/em><\/p>\n

Folks, some internal force came growling out of me.<\/p>\n

So, I respond, “Hmm. That’s interesting. Her skirt looked perfectly fine this morning. I’m not sure what changed, but I’ll be right there.” Click.<\/p>\n

Okay, so here’s the part where I prove how mature I am…<\/p>\n

“JEREMY!!!” I scream as I go stomping down the hallway toward Avery’s bedroom.<\/p>\n

“What?” he yells back.<\/p>\n

“The school thinks Avery dresses like a whore.” Well, that got his attention.<\/p>\n

“What are you talking about?” he asks as he charges out of our bedroom.<\/p>\n

“They just called and want me to bring Avery something new to wear. Apparently<\/em> her skirt is way too short so I need to bring her some pants or something,” I growl as I start tossing things out of her drawers.<\/p>\n

“I don’t get it. Why would you dress her in such a short skirt?”<\/p>\n

“Um, I didn’t Jer. It was absolutely fine. Obviously, unbeknownst to us,Avery has been transferred from public school to Quaker school.”<\/p>\n

“Well, that’s just great,” he adds.<\/p>\n

“Uh, yah.”<\/p>\n

I drove to the school ina fury and approached the office doors willing myself to settle down a little bit and deal with the situation in a calm and collected manner. I’m pretty sure my look said it all as I walked through the doors. The school secretary smiled at me, immediately sensing that I was in no mood to talk andcalled Avery down from her classroom.As she walked towards me I recognized, as I already had that morning, that her skirtwas absolutely fine. She could have practically fit in as a member of the Duggar clan with that skirt. She looked properly innocent and young. Not a harlot in sight.<\/p>\n

We switched out her skirt for a (long) pair of bootcut pants and I sent her off to class, me still bristling a bit and her completely oblivious to there ever having been a problem. Like it’s absolutely common for a kid to switch outfits halfway through the day. That’s so<\/em> Avery.<\/p>\n

I learned something about myself today. I learned that I really don’t appreciate having my judgment questioned. I learned that sometimes saying nothing speaks volumes<\/em>. I learned that when it comes to my kids I have a very low tolerance for nonsense and Ilearned that Avery’s school has a ridiculously low tolerance for jean skirts. (I also learned thatanger triggers for me an insatiable craving for Otis Spunkmeyer cookies. Thank you cookie dough fundraisers for accomodating me.)<\/p>\n

But most importantly, I’ve learned that my ‘Mama Bear’ instinct is alive and kicking. And although, ultimately, today was not that day, when I do choose to unleash the beast she will be ready and willing.<\/p>\n

Keepin’ it real on Friday,<\/em><\/p>\n

Mindy<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I had an interesting thing happen today which caused my baser instinct to come roaring through my otherwise gentile personality. Ahem. What? My daughter, Avery, is in the first grade and attends public school. Every morning I pick out her clothes because if her daily ensemble were up to her she’d probably wear her ripped […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1,22],"tags":[54,332,65],"class_list":{"0":"post-1421","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-stuff","7":"category-family-life","8":"tag-children","9":"tag-mama-bear-instinct","10":"tag-the-suburban-life","11":"entry"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thesuburbanlife.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1421","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thesuburbanlife.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thesuburbanlife.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thesuburbanlife.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thesuburbanlife.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1421"}],"version-history":[{"count":12,"href":"https:\/\/www.thesuburbanlife.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1421\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1433,"href":"https:\/\/www.thesuburbanlife.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1421\/revisions\/1433"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thesuburbanlife.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1421"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thesuburbanlife.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1421"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thesuburbanlife.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1421"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}