I've never been in a car line but wow, people have some feelings here, lol.
People whine and whine about car line around here. Yet we have pretty good bussing and also many people are walkable to school, but I guess don't want their sweet precious utilizing these options (even pre covid) so they just bitch about car line.
As someone whose kid will absolutely 100% walk to elementary, I love reading the drama. LOL
I've never been in a car line but wow, people have some feelings here, lol.
People whine and whine about car line around here. Yet we have pretty good bussing and also many people are walkable to school, but I guess don't want their sweet precious utilizing these options (even pre covid) so they just bitch about car line.
As someone whose kid will absolutely 100% walk to elementary, I love reading the drama. LOL
I wish DS could walk. But he'd have to cross a state highway with major speeding problems, and it's-or-miss whether the crossing guard shows up. And while my employer is ok with me missing 10 to 15 minutes first thing in the morning to drop him off via car, they'd be less pleased with me missing 30+ minutes to walk with him.
Anyone else have anything they need to get off their chest? Post it here!
RE: School drop-off car line.
If your child is old enough to go to kindergarten (neurodivergent and mobility issues excepted), they are old enough to get out of the car by themselves without your help. Stay in your car, and keep the line moving.
My kid couldn't because he couldn't unbuckle his 5 point harness. My co workers son can't either. IDK, i get the drop off line being a shitshow but also don't think there is anything weird about a 6 year old needing some help. The school should have a separate are for parents to park if they have to help out.
Same. DD1 was in a 5-pt harness in K and there's no way I could have reached over to unbuckle her. BUT, I knew this and therefore park a couple of blocks away from the school to avoid the twin shitshows of the car line AND all the people double-parking on the other side of the school. Even though she can unbuckle herself now, we still avoid the car line. We've been walking to school from where we park and seen accidents multiple times in the car line area (thankfully just fender-benders, no injuries to anyone).
My rant is that so many people are out there living their best lives, no care in the world, when pandemic case rates are much higher now than they were last April. Brought to you by good friends on a group trip to the Poconos which is currently at an "Extremely High" risk of exposure. I just want to cry because I feel like people really don't care about spread and consequently we'll never be done with variants.
Seeing the same here. We are like the only family still trying to be safe. And the scary part is we go back to full day school in two weeks- 30 kids per class 😳
My dad is fully vaccinated (for awhile now) but came down with a cough right before Easter. It sucks but we postponed seeing them. He even went to urgent care and they said “not COVID” without testing him. They both understand but at the same time indicated that we were being a little over the top. Sorry, I don’t want any germs right now- DS1 needs to be in school for everyone’s sake!
Post by luv2rn4fun on Apr 12, 2021 11:12:01 GMT -5
cricketwife- I am SO sorry for your loss and the extra hard challenges surrounding the funeral. I hope the wife realizes the unfairness in all this and comes to her senses so your DH can attend his father’s funeral.
Our school district wants us to make a decision about whether to enroll in the Virtual Academy for the 2021/2022 school year by May 1st. Cases are out of control in Michigan right now, we won't have a good grasp on a vaccine timeline for elementary aged kids by then, and my husband and I won't even know if we will still be able to work from home next academic year by that point.
We had to put our request in by last week for virtual for next year. I get they need to plan, but it’s extra hard bc it’s the dodea military schools and people don’t even know where they will be living in the fall! Anyway, I hope you can figure it out!
Post by pinkdutchtulips on Apr 12, 2021 12:14:34 GMT -5
I heard all sort of gripes, vents, rants about school drop-off lines that I was always relieved that I dropped off DD at before school care so I never had to deal with that line. Ditto for pick-up line bc she was always picked up 5m before aftercare closed at 6pm.
My thought has always been if your child needs assistance getting out of their car seat in elementary school, park and walk in. There is no need to hold up the line.
Anyone else have anything they need to get off their chest? Post it here!
RE: School drop-off car line.
If your child is old enough to go to kindergarten (neurodivergent and mobility issues excepted), they are old enough to get out of the car by themselves without your help. Stay in your car, and keep the line moving.
Huh. My 4.5 year old definitely can't unbuckle himself and get out of the car alone. I guess I should start working on that? I mean its moot for your issue because we're walkers, but this hasn't been on my radar.
our drop off line, parking is definitely not an option. However, i will say it's slow moving enough that at some point I can come to a stop, put car in park, lean back and unbuckle, and get going again without disrupting flow of car behind me. So this leave hers unbuckled for the remainder of the line but I'm unconcerned something will happen. She is able to get her bookbag on an ready to hop out of car. On rare occassion little sister is in her car seat, I hand her bookbag out the window to her. Teachers open car doors.
I've never been in a car line but wow, people have some feelings here, lol.
I'm laughing at this because DD1 takes and loves the bus, but I'm terrified of the day I need to drop her off. She's in K and in a 5-point harness that she can't undo herself, so I'll need to get out. And her carseat is on the wrong side of the car, it goes on and on. I'm scared of being the person everyone complains about!
This is so me! I have a 12 year old and an 8 year old. I’ve only ever done the drop off line approx. 3 times, because it stresses me out so much, with how worked up people get about it. The school is constantly sending out narrative instructions that make no sense, and there are online fights about it, and middle fingers flying and...ugh. No thank you. There is no spot for us to park (lot is full) so if you need to drop off - drop off line it is.
My youngest is a scrawny little thing, and didn’t even weigh enough to not be harnessed until very recently. Undoing the buckle made it that much harder.
The times I’ve needed to drop my kids off, they’ve been intentionally tardy just so I could avoid that horrid line.
I've never been in a car line but wow, people have some feelings here, lol.
People whine and whine about car line around here. Yet we have pretty good bussing and also many people are walkable to school, but I guess don't want their sweet precious utilizing these options (even pre covid) so they just bitch about car line.
As someone whose kid will absolutely 100% walk to elementary, I love reading the drama. LOL
They basically reduced the bussing to nothing this year due to Covid restrictions. Prior to that all kids were offered the bus for free, so it’s been a drastic shift. Our carline is actually really efficient, especially considering the schools never really did one before since everyone took the bus.
ETA: maybe our carline is set up different than other schools. We have a drop off zone. A batch of about 8 cars pull in at once, everyone gets out, and then the cars move and the next batch goes in. Teachers don’t open doors. It’s not like a moving line. Who knows. You aren’t allowed to park and walk your kid in. 🤷🏽♀️
My kids walk themselves to school, but my 7.5 year old is tiny and still harnessed and cannot get out of the car solo. I think she is ready for a high back booster. Just haven't got around to it yet.
I haven't done the car line ever since it looks like a pain in the ass.
I reluctantly dropped everything and did the yearbook for DD's school once it became clear that the parent volunteer wasn't going to do it. As thanks, I now have an angry parent harassing me because she forgot to buy her children yearbooks. She had 6 months to buy them with the purchase info in the principal's weekly email to parents (the school's primary form of communication) along with a note that the yearbooks are preorder only and no extras are ordered. Look, if you didn't get your shit together in 6 months, it wasn't really that important to you and leave me the fuck alone about it. Multiple emails saying that surely there will be extra yearbooks (I'm not fucking lying to you!) and that your children will just be crushed if I can't reopen the yearbook order portal are ridiculous. The only way to order additional yearbooks would be to charge everyone more to cover the cost of the extra yearbooks (someone has to pay for the damn things) and if I reopen the order, we won't receive the entire order until 2 weeks after school ends, which is absurd. The attempted guilt trip is infuriating. I fucking hate the yearbook. If nobody steps up to do it next year, there just won't be one.
If there do happen to be extra yearbooks, I would burn them rather than sell them to her.
I reluctantly dropped everything and did the yearbook for DD's school once it became clear that the parent volunteer wasn't going to do it. As thanks, I now have an angry parent harassing me because she forgot to buy her children yearbooks. She had 6 months to buy them with the purchase info in the principal's weekly email to parents (the school's primary form of communication) along with a note that the yearbooks are preorder only and no extras are ordered. Look, if you didn't get your shit together in 6 months, it wasn't really that important to you and leave me the fuck alone about it. Multiple emails saying that surely there will be extra yearbooks (I'm not fucking lying to you!) and that your children will just be crushed if I can't reopen the yearbook order portal are ridiculous. The only way to order additional yearbooks would be to charge everyone more to cover the cost of the extra yearbooks (someone has to pay for the damn things) and if I reopen the order, we won't receive the entire order until 2 weeks after school ends, which is absurd. The attempted guilt trip is infuriating. I fucking hate the yearbook. If nobody steps up to do it next year, there just won't be one.
I did yearbook in HS and thought it would be fun to do again in dental school. OMG the book for our senior year was such an enormous time suck for me and my co-editor. Literally no one appreciated how much time went into making that thing. I warned my friend who also did yearbook with me in HS and was a freshman in dental school the year I was a senior to stay far far away and not get involved with year book at all in dental school.
I was thinking about this the other day and hoping that it is much easier to do these days since everything is digital. Sorry she is being such a pain.
I may have to be PTA President next year because they haven't found another sucker to do it. I said I would do VP, but apparently no one has stepped up for President.
Guys, I don't even really like people, esp other parents. DH finds this absolutely hilarious that I'm in this position. He's like "but you said you were just doing this one event and that's it" while he laughs and laughs.
There are 2 teachers manning the car line at DD's school. You pull up to 1 of the teachers, they help your kid out with their 219492846 lb bags, they escort your kid to the sidewalk and the kid walks over to their assigned door where there are more teachers. In the meantime, you leave. You can also park on the side streets and walk your kid to the door if you want, but I always have DS with me and would never do that. Honestly I'd do a slow roll and tell DD to jump out if I could get away with it! (joking LOL)
I don't know if it's a rant exactly, but I just had to say "I cannot think for everyone in this family" so I apparently have reached peak mom. I guess the rant part is the problem that prompted me to say that.
Bad Dingo, We are being as careful as we can and still do some things (masked/ outside). But my county has been very high risk the entire pandemic, so I am not basing my life around the very high risk status. Especially when our numbers had been very low and positivity rate low, it still said we were very high risk.
But yeah watching some people tra la la travel all over and post it on social media is a lot. If you are going to travel right now, maybe just don't post on FB.
My rant is my mom and dad. Mom is supportive, but she constantly complains, forgets things we do for her, then gets hurt because she forgot. Maybe she is losing some of her sharpness, but it's been a lot with the pandemic. Parents are divorced.
TLDR: Dad wants me to plan a week long vacation so he can spend time with the kids. I offered a weekend, and he was super rude about it. Every time he sees my kids he ignores them for the most part anyway. I don't want to bother planning anything for rude people.
Dad lives in a foreign country, and is coming to visit this summer. He is starting a guilt trip that my sister and I have to plan a weeklong vacation with him. My sister did this a couple of years ago, and I came for a couple of days and stayed elsewhere. I offered to do a weekend trip, and that wasn't good enough. I then got a snarky email back on how that wasn't good enough. I decided that with the snarky email that I wasn't doing shit. Why do I owe him a vacation when it's his fault he chose to live in another country, and didn't come back for 2 years (also the pandemic's fault). I just don't think I owe him a vacation at all. So when I did offer a weekend, I was being nice to him, and he just shoves it back in my face. Now I will get 50 emails on how I need to plan this vacation with my sister, and I'm just not going to. So I don't know, but I really don't feel like planning something for ungrateful people who do nothing to support us. He wants to spend time with the kids. OK, so when he sees the kids he just ignores them. He doesn't cook dinner or help out there. He doesn't pick up stuff even off the floor he just keeps stepping over stuff. He doesn't babysit, and the kids are old enough we could leave them for an hour on their own. But he isn't qualified to assist them in any way. Like we couldn't trust him to be in charge of them. He spends all his time on his phone talking to girlfriends. On vacation, was a bit nicer because he wasn't on his phone, but otherwise I don't even see why he visits. When my sister first said he ignores her kids, I thought wow she must be over reacting. Her kids are older, so it happened for her first. Then I had my kids, and sure enough he just ignores them. It's odd because I thought he was involved when we were young, but at a certain age I think he ignored us too which is one of the reasons we lived with our mom. He spent the entire first part of the pandemic giving me anxiety by emailing me conspiracy theories and telling me I need visit him when all the borders were closed and flights were cancelled.
Oh my other rant of a family member offering nothing and asking for all the effort is BIL. He doesn't work, doesn't communicate about FIL and MIL health issues, doesn't go to school. Really doesn't do anything, maybe a favor here or there for FIL. FIL And MIL support him.
Calls me up to ask me the kids birthdays (misses both of them), demands to know our religious views so he can give them agnostic materials if it is OK then gets mad that picture books are too young for my kids. He probably still will not ever send a present, which is fine I never wanted one. Then says he can never visit, but we should bring the kids to him. OK dude great effort that only involved more work for me to make it all about you...... And the reason he can never visit, drumroll please, he has cats. I have a cat, dog, 2 kids, and a husband, so I should make the drive LOL for days.
I reluctantly dropped everything and did the yearbook for DD's school once it became clear that the parent volunteer wasn't going to do it. As thanks, I now have an angry parent harassing me because she forgot to buy her children yearbooks. She had 6 months to buy them with the purchase info in the principal's weekly email to parents (the school's primary form of communication) along with a note that the yearbooks are preorder only and no extras are ordered. Look, if you didn't get your shit together in 6 months, it wasn't really that important to you and leave me the fuck alone about it. Multiple emails saying that surely there will be extra yearbooks (I'm not fucking lying to you!) and that your children will just be crushed if I can't reopen the yearbook order portal are ridiculous. The only way to order additional yearbooks would be to charge everyone more to cover the cost of the extra yearbooks (someone has to pay for the damn things) and if I reopen the order, we won't receive the entire order until 2 weeks after school ends, which is absurd. The attempted guilt trip is infuriating. I fucking hate the yearbook. If nobody steps up to do it next year, there just won't be one.
If there do happen to be extra yearbooks, I would burn them rather than sell them to her.
The company sends us 5 or so extras for free in case there are any problems with actual orders. If we don’t need them, we give them to our counselor to distribute as she sees fit. She gives them to 5th graders who couldn’t afford to order one. Fuck no am I selling them to her instead.
I may have to be PTA President next year because they haven't found another sucker to do it. I said I would do VP, but apparently no one has stepped up for President.
Guys, I don't even really like people, esp other parents. DH finds this absolutely hilarious that I'm in this position. He's like "but you said you were just doing this one event and that's it" while he laughs and laughs.
This local PTA President and council VP also hates people. Welcome!
In all seriousness, I’ve actually enjoyed it very much. If you need any guidance or just need to vent, please reach out. Getting started is the hardest part.
I was a sub para who frequently worked the car line at drop off & pickup times. Every time I felt lucky to walk away alive. Between parents looking at their phones while driving and parents who can't possibly wait their turn so they drop their kid off too early and then zoom around other cars/walkers it was scary.
Post by bookqueen15 on Apr 12, 2021 20:57:39 GMT -5
The buckle bee saved us before kindergarten when my DD couldn't unbuckle her 5 point harness herself and we had to do the car line! She still uses it this year in 1st grade. Our school strongly discourages parking on side streets and walking to school and we live too far (and across a major highway) to walk from home. My DD is still pretty slow getting out of the car but the buckle bee really helped!
Now the people who don't join the car line at the intersection where it starts and cut in on side streets really annoy me though! Our car line spans about 5-6 blocks in the morning but luckily moves pretty fast.
Anyone else have anything they need to get off their chest? Post it here!
RE: School drop-off car line.
If your child is old enough to go to kindergarten (neurodivergent and mobility issues excepted), they are old enough to get out of the car by themselves without your help. Stay in your car, and keep the line moving.
Huh. My 4.5 year old definitely can't unbuckle himself and get out of the car alone. I guess I should start working on that? I mean its moot for your issue because we're walkers, but this hasn't been on my radar.
DS1 turned 6 last week and he literally just figured out how to unbuckle himself. But we've gone through the car rider line less than five times all year. I typically park and walk him over to the front door. He could for sure get out by himself now, but he likes to give hugs and kisses before he walks in and I'm going to take that for as long as I can get it.
My kid recently joined Boy Scouts. I searched threads here, I googled, I checked Reddit, and most of the stuff I saw said the religion aspect of scouts is super minor.
Well, my kid has completed all the stuff to level up *except* something about "affirming his relationship with God." I'm atheist, my husband is agnostic at best, and my kids' experience with religion basically consists of us googling the holidays on the wall calendar. My husband is in charge of having the conversation with the pack leader, an older woman, and he's feeling guilty because we've already disappointed our own mothers by not baptizing our children.
He would just pencil whip it and say the kid did the task, but leadership announces all the tasks and awards the badges in front of everyone at the pack meeting and he doesn't want to lie.
The whole thing is just ridiculous enough that I'm laughing about it. If watching that one episode of Peg + Cat for eid mubarak counts, we'll be fine, LOL.
I feel like there’s a workaround for non-religious people that involves just learning about different religions rather than practicing them. Hopefully your pack leader has good answers for you! We are religious and I have still found that aspect of scouting to be more intense than I was expecting.
Anyone else have anything they need to get off their chest? Post it here!
RE: School drop-off car line.
If your child is old enough to go to kindergarten (neurodivergent and mobility issues excepted), they are old enough to get out of the car by themselves without your help. Stay in your car, and keep the line moving.
My 6 year old is still under 40 lbs, so not at the weight limit for a booster. She can usually get herself unbuckled from her harness, but occasionally I have to get out and help her (she’s in the third row of our van, so I can’t just reach back) 🤷🏼♀️
There is no “park and get out” option at her school. The parking lot is on the other side of the complex of three schools, which is directly off of a four lane highway.
IMO, there is a big difference between a parent quickly helping a kid out of a carseat and the parent who rolls up to the school, waits until they are at the front of the line, then decides to put everything in little Susie's backpack, have a discussion, give her 5 kisses, and 7 hugs, then leisurely get back in their car while watching little Susie walk into the building despite plenty of adults outside monitoring.
I've never been in a car line but wow, people have some feelings here, lol.
The tales of drop off lines were a big factor in deciding to use the bus for kindergarten this year (well and the timing of school and our work days) Our school has seemingly legendary car lines issues because it’s on a main road with no sidewalks and therefore not walkable for anyone really. The schools in our town went back 5 days last week and apparently it’s been quite the scene. Extra grateful for the school bus!
My rant is how our county has worked with virtual and hybrid students as covid numbers improve here. Our numbers are going down so hybrid (and ONLY hybrid) students were told they can go back to school 4x a week (Mon is still asynchronous for everyone). Virtual students were not given this option and I am pissed. We chose virtual for DD back in June and then November when numbers were insane, but it was also predicated on that fact that the best option was going to be 2 days in person and 3 days asynchronous. Never "full time". Now that H and I are partially vaccinated this changes everything. It seems so unfair to only open this option to one set of students when the parameters changed. Of course the hybrid parents are flaunting it on FB and saying "you made your choice."
My rant is how our county has worked with virtual and hybrid students as covid numbers improve here. Our numbers are going down so hybrid (and ONLY hybrid) students were told they can go back to school 4x a week (Mon is still asynchronous for everyone). Virtual students were not given this option and I am pissed. We chose virtual for DD back in June and then November when numbers were insane, but it was also predicated on that fact that the best option was going to be 2 days in person and 3 days asynchronous. Never "full time". Now that H and I are partially vaccinated this changes everything. It seems so unfair to only open this option to one set of students when the parameters changed. Of course the hybrid parents are flaunting it on FB and saying "you made your choice."
I totally hear you on this. Our state legislature finally required all school systems to give parents a choice to go back, and the email from school asking if Virtual students want to return basically said, "We don't want to give you this choice but the legislature made us, so, do you want to come back?" :/ Nothing like not feeling welcome.