The Eagle Has Landed

Two words designed to instill fear into the toughest mother: School and Play. Inevitably this is going to lead to the single most terrifying word in a mother's language. COSTUME!

My son came home a few weeks ago with the joyous news that his school is putting on a production of Jack in the Beanstalk, and that he has a starring role. A starring role as an... eagle. Now, I know I've lost a few brain cells over the years, but for the life of me I don't remember an eagle playing a starring role in the story of Jack and the Beanstalk. Jack - check. Mother of Jack - check. A cow - check. Some beans - absolutely. A cranky giant - yep. An eagle - WTF?

Let me just state for the record that as far as arts and crafts go, I am about as useful as a chocolate teapot. I am all for it, in principle. I can dream up the loveliest of arty and crafty goodness however I am genetically incapable of transforming my ideas into tangible objects. I have an entire cupboard full of half-knitted scarves, quarter-made necklaces, oil paints hardened into stone, beads, wires, strings, ribbons, glues, buttons and so forth. I even (laughingly) dabbled in scrapbooking to the tune of about $300 with sweet FA to show for it.

Anyway. I was stuck with the task of creatively transforming my 10 year old son into an eagle. Oh, I had some doozies of ideas. Huge feathered wings, spanning 6 feet or more, detailed ankle whatsits with talons glued on, a tail that a peacock would be proud of and so much more.

PPPFFFFFFTTTTT. When whining and moaning on FB and Twitter to more crafty friends yielded no help other than detailed instructions of what their talented hands could put together I did what any mother could be expected to do under the circumstances. I blanked it from my mind entirely.

Dear son reminded me ever so gently on Monday that this Friday is the dress rehearsal, and that the Big Performance is next Tuesday night. Right. Time to get my arse in gear. Fortunately, I was informed, one of the pre-primary teachers has some wings lying about that will do the trick, so all we needed to come up with was clothing (yet to be comed-up-with) and some sort of head gear.

This being Thursday, it appeared I was going to have to take action Today, and Not A Moment Later. My first thought was to use a baseball cap, bend the visor into a beak-like shape and stick feathers over the rest of it. Let's just say the bending-of-the-visor-into-a-beak-like-shape part of that had me totally stumped, so it was back to the drawing board.

A brief forraging session in the garage unearthed a detachable hood from one of the kids' old winter coats, one which tied up under the chin. This looked promising! Surely I could fashion a beak out of something and then use strips of felt as feathers. YES! This would work.

Off to Spotlight I went, returning armed with hot glue gun, felt and more felt. Plus 2 huge googly eyes that I just thought were funny.

You think it would be easier to fashion a beak out of stiffened felt. Sensibly I tried a few practice ones out of paper. Not working. Finally we got there on the beak, and glued it onto the hood. It looked great! I was ecstatic! I'm not kidding here, I was dancing with glee around the house!


I suppose at this point I should say a big thank you to the water carafe and football who generously offered to model the headpiece during it's creation, and didn't complain once, not even when hot glue went all over the footie. What good little helpers!


From this point on it was fairly easy. I cut long triangle-shaped strips of different coloured felt, and glued them around in rows. The crowning glory of googly eyes went on and... it was complete. It sat there on its football just staring at me. I called my son over to look and there was, well, silence. He looked at me, I looked back. We both looked at the result of my efforts. I'm not sure which one of us collapsed in a hysterical puddle on the floor first, but within moments we were both there. Literally Unable To Speak.

Once he caught his breath, he agreed to try it on. I must say, I was impressed. It was less scary than it had been on the football. He agreed to let me photograph him in it, on the proviso that I didn't get his face or any other identifying features in the shot. I agreed.


Naturally I had to try it on as well (as you do) and, having no qualms about my scary mug being exposed to all and sundry on the WWW, demanded that M play photographer this time.

Well, that was fun, and here's the result:


God help us all if any of my children take up acting. I'm going to have to marry a seamstress!

*Update* I went to the school and grabbed the wings so M could try on the whole costume, and thought I'd share:


STxxx

Mini Rant

School. Specifically primary school. Kiss and Drive.

It serves a purpose, people, don't mess with it. Don't be selfish bastards who block up the entire suburb because you are too fucking pathetically lazy to get out of your car, or park further away, or... or... arrive later?

Oh, that brings me to stupid. Don't be stupid. The siren goes off at 2:50pm. Why do at least 10 massive 4WD-driving parents have to show up 10 minutes early and block off the entire kiss and drive area. And not move until 3:10 if that's when your kidlet shows up?

Society is selfish. Very, very, very selfish. People simply don't give a fuck about other people, and it breaks my heart (and does wonders for my pedestal). How do you spell "pedestal", by the way, that looks right, and yet so wrong, all in one word.

It's quite simple, the whole concept of the whole kiss and drive. You pull into one of the 6 designated bays, you have approximately 1 minute to attempt to identify your child (and I admit this can be tough, given they are all dressed identically), and if you don't see your child, you pull out, drive around the block and get back in line.

This is fair. This is democratic. This is first-in-best-dressed. This is the only way it can work without causing gridlock for 3km in either direction. DON'T be the wanker who decides to sit there for 10 minutes and wait because you are too fucking lazy to put your automatic Lexus 4WD into D and spend 45 seconds driving around the teeny-tiny block. Have a heart for those of us who are racing from work at top speed attempting to collect our Small People before school admin call DOCS on us. If your child is not there, MOVE FUCKING ON!

And while I'm at it, a word to the parents of younger children who park, then wait outside the classroom. I used to be you. I get it. It's annoying that for a school of 600 Small People there are only 50 parallel streetside parking spots. But please, do you REALLY need to leave 3 metres in front and back of your car so you can easily pull out? Once again I beg you to have a heart. If you leave a space in front and back just large enough that another car can't quite squeeze in, you really don't have the right to object when I encourage my children to throw mud at your car on our way to the parking space I found in the next suburb. No, you don't.

It's actually possible to parallel park in a manner that will allow the maximum possible number of parents to fit in a limited space. It's possible to park in a manner that actually takes into consideration the amount of space you are taking up versus the needs of other parents.

Oh, and while I'm still ranting, you total and utter morons who park across the entire footpath? I hope you rot in hell. Do you not realise that kids ride bikes to school, and some parents have to push baby-siblings in prams to get to the classroom? Are you so fucking lazy that your only option was to park somewhere you blocked the entire footpath thus denying children and pram-pushing parents their divine-given right to move safely?

I realise, obviously, that there are families with special needs. I was one of them, FFS. I tore all the ligaments in my ankle, and still had to deliver kidlets to classrooms and so forth. I quite simply went to the office and explained my need and got special permission to use the disabled spot for X weeks as needed.

It's not rocket science, people; it's quite simply common courtesy.

Is this a lost art? I fear it is.

STxxx