The Post-It-Note Apology - Part II | Maris Ehlers Photography

Some of you saw my post yesterday regarding a forgiveness lesson post-it-note style from my six year old.  If you haven't read it, please do so before reading this post.  It will all make more sense if you do.

For the rest of you...  fast forward to last Friday night (four days after the math lab debacle).  The kids had a carnival at school, and we had been looking forward to it for several weeks.  I purchased the game tickets and our dinner tickets ahead of time as requested by the school, and made a big deal about them when my son brought them home in his backpack.

I told the kids I was putting the tickets in my kitchen drawer so we wouldn't lose them.  So proud of myself!  Why?  Because typically, I'd be the first one to lose them.

There were strips of red tickets for the games and activities, and a small orange piece of paper for our dinner receipt.  It was stapled to the game tickets with the typical "YOU NEED TO BRING THIS RECEIPT WITH YOU IN ORDER TO RECEIVE YOUR MEALS".

As we were getting ready to go, I went to grab the tickets out of the drawer.  There were the red tickets, but no dinner ticket receipt.  My husband immediately started to remind me of how I lose everything (mostly true).  I was adamant that I had put them all in the drawer.  I then told him one of the kids must have taken it, to which he rolled his eyes (all true). At that moment, my daughter came running down the stairs so I asked her if she had taken the dinner ticket from the drawer and if she knew where it was.

She looked at me, she looked at her dad.  While trying to assess the sitaution, she acknowledged that she didn't know where it was, but did cough up that she had taken the dinner ticket out to look at it "a long time ago".  I asked her where she put it.  "Um, on the kitchen counter, I think." At this point she began to realize her folly.

After searching for it in the kitchen drawers, her art cubby, the toy box and all of her other special hiding places, I gave up.  I really tried not to get frustrated, but that was $16 down the drain.  No receipt... no dinner and now I had about three minutes to pull dinner out of my hat (or the fridge).

Of course my son then got mad because we wouldn't be having pizza for dinner at school and had to create his own drama for my daughter's benefit, so you can imagine how those last few minutes at home went.

I knew Amelia felt bad, and I told her it was okay, but she knew I was annoyed and was trying to be nice about it.  

After a delicious dinner of microwaved hot dogs and grapes, I walked into my office to grab my purse as I hustled the kids out the door.  On my computer monitor was this LAVENDER post-it-note apology.  :)

Monday's events flashed before my eyes, and I realized she had learned a lesson that day, too.  That a simple apology, however you can say it with meaning, is the right thing to do.

So with hugs and kisses (and a growing collection of post-it apologies), off we went.  

The best part of the night other than the wacky hair booth? They had so many pizzas left over at the end of the carnival that they started giving them away. We walked out of there with a full large pepperoni pizza from our local Jimmy's Pizza to take home and enjoy. 

Can't get much better than that!