Monday

The Tuesday Folder

I've learned to both love and dread The Tuesday Folder.

It contains a slew of information pertaining to the activities in my kid's classrooms. It's sent home every week.

On Tuesday. (These teachers don't kid around. I think a romantic name like, "folder of endless work and vital information" is a catchy title. But no one asked me).

It also contains completed assignments from the past week tucked into the KEEP side of the folder.

And my son?  Yeah, he takes the KEEP part very seriously.
 
As I sorted and read the endless pile of papers in my daughter's folder the other day, I came across this page:

Her first cursive writing assignment.

She is excited about learning cursive writing and I knew she'd be proud to show it off.  But I was concerned about some of the letters that were circled. They looked fine to me...Maybe her teacher was taking the cursive thing a little too seriously.

Me: "This looks great!  But why are some of them circled?" (I'm mentally thinking parent teacher conference. Yes, I'm one of THOSE parents).

Her: "Oh, I just circled my favorite ones!" And she sauntered off.

Call me hormonal, but I wanted to weep and laugh all at once. It was so cute. She circled her favorites! I remember doing that. The pride I had for my cursive i's was unhealthy. 

I moved onto my son's Tuesday Folder. Once I looked at everything, I took out the important things and threw the rest away.

Including this:


Of course my son discovered his papers at the top of the trash about 37 seconds later, including a map to his room.

Him: "Mom! These are KEEP papers. You can't throw them away. "

Me: "Honey, I looked at them and saved some, but I can't KEEP everything."

Him: "Well. You should KEEP this map to my bedroom for when my teacher comes over."

Me: 'Huh? What? Gasp! You're teacher is coming here?"

Him: "Yep, when I earn enough tickets. She'll need to find her way to my room!"

Well.  Apparently, I missed that note in The Tuesday Folder.

32 comments:

Lisa said...

Oh my goodness, I am finding myself laughing out loud at this. I would love to be a fly on your wall, or something. The things your family comes up with just brings laughter to my spirit and I so enjoy that. A map to my bedroom, that just cracks me up. And I am sorry, I never circled things I liked, and that caught me off guard. I was fearful for just a moment, for I too was looking it over and thought it looked really good so why was it circled. It made me smile when she said there were her favorites, that is just AWESOME. She finds, sees, looks, for the positive things in life....you are doing a GREAT job with those kids.

Anonymous said...

Very cute post. We get our folders home on Monday. I have three little boys that want to give me all of their papers from their folders all at once. No wonder there are days I miss those valuable notes.

Thanks again for featuring my blog. I have received several emails and great comments.

Have a great week Kristen and keep up the great work!

Anonymous said...

LOL - that's hilarious!

First, all of the spelling curriculum we've used has asked the student to circle their best letter or word, or whatever they were copying. So when I saw the picture, I automatically assumed she had circled her best and thought nothing of it. :P

But on top of that - my girls both have a BAD case of The Keeps!! I have to sneak doodles and pretend invitations and Sunday school papers into the trash when they're not looking. ;)

Unknown said...

Hilarious.

Oh yes - got to be sure to destroy the evidence of the unkept keeping stuff.

Love how she circled her favorite ones too!

Jeanette said...

I immediately thought the same thing you did. Why did that teacher circle those letters? They looked great to me to! Jokes on us, eh?

Note to self, bury all evidence at the BOTTOM of the garbage can!

Hugs!

Shane H. said...

I'm totally with you, except in our case, it's the Wednesday folder. I learned very quickly to hide the "throw away" papers a little deeper in the trash can. :)

Stacey said...

My older son was into the Keep thing also. We had things from preschool...no joke until about two years ago. He's 19!!

I love your sense of humor and your blog.:)

marky said...

I just threw away my oldest kids papers a few years ago, and they are in their 20's.
Fortunately with homeschooling we don't have as much to save.
Your daughter has very nice cursive!

Andrea said...

Don't stress the papers. When they reach Jr. High, no papers appear. At least that is what my son tells me everyday - no papers. Love the blog!

Anonymous said...

hahahah innocence is priceless and really funny too! Wait until he sneaks home and dreads the call from the teacher :o)
I would have gone to Walmart and gotten a cheap frame so he could keep his map to his room. And the next time you see the teacher tell her you need a ticket and tuck it into the back for when he was older. I did that with a pic my daughter did and to this day (even with a move to a new house) she still has her picture out to proudly display.

a Tonggu Momma said...

Kristen ~ This made me smile through a few tears. I wrote something for Rosie's memory boo today. (All of the neighbors, friends and relatives are sharing memories so we can make a book for the twins.)

Anyways, Rosie never threw away anything her kids made... Not. One. Thing. I finally made her do it last year, by teaching her to lay out 20 or so "art" pieces on the floor, taking a picture of it, then picking one thing to keep.

I weeded through all kinds of stuff and got her organized. Thought your son might appreciate this idea.

Anonymous said...

Hello! I have been reading your blog for some time but this is my first time commenting. I can't quit laughing about your son's paper and his teacher coming over. That is so gosh darn cute!
My daughter is the same way about "keep" papers so I began pushing them down towards the bottom of the trash can.
Thanks for posting. I alway enjoy coming by to visit you! =)

a Tonggu Momma said...

Yeah... that would be memory BOOK, not boo. Wouldn't want to scare grieving children. (hitting self on the head now)

Pamela said...

I read a hint once on how to "keep" the precious work of our kids. Buy a big tub or use a box of some type. Keep everything for the school year. At the end of the year, decide what to keep. If you think that will still be a problem and you will still have too many papers, decide before you start how many papers you will be able to keep. Then you go through the papers, count, and if you need to go through again, do so until you get down to the set number. It is fun to see how their work improves over the months. Also, what once was a keeper kind of looses the importance of why they wanted to keep it.

I read this hint after my kids were out of that stage. I still kept a few things and it is fun to look back at them. I love the one where my son described his grandma looking like a witch when she would take her hair down from the top of her head and wash it. I don't think grandma ever saw that paper!

Unknown said...

LOL your kids are too funny! I love that she circled her favorites. That is so funny! And you never know when you might need a map to his room especially if you get up in the middle of the night and forget where in the world you are. It could be helpful! Ya never know!

Anonymous said...

Ohhhh my goodness! Thank you for the morning laugh!

Our life is a bowl of Barry's said...

Your daughter's cursive is impressive!!! From your gene's right? My husband has never written in cursive since I have known him (and that's a long time) so I don't know how my boys will fare in the cursive dept. And me? I'm a halfsie-half cursive, half print, all in the same word. Like THAT'S not confusing to my kids!! Bury those papers DEEP in the trash, I've found my boys will only search the first clean layer, although if it happens to be clean and still readable after they dump the trash, it's likely to end up in their room again. They're just as bad as their dad. If I want something permanently thrown out, it has to go in the outside trash!

Unknown said...

We get our papers on Fridays, but they really do keep them - they have to be filed in tabs in a binder. At the end of the year, we can toss what we want (Umm, yeah, I have some boxes of past papers to go through).

You have to keep the map - that's too funny! Hopefully you'll hear about the teacher coming over at least a few minutes before she gets there! :)

Patti said...

How funny!

Since we homeschool, the kids are not always excited about keeping things. They are excited about destruction. As in "May I BURN these math papers?" I have to be quick to save the ones I need to keep for their portfolio.

Oh, and for handwriting, I always circled my favorites. Often with a Heart. :-)

Enjoy where you are in life!

Happy Mommy said...

Funny how we keep most of our kids projects but they always see when we throw something away!

Storytellin' Mama said...

It is amazing to me the amount of work, notes, fliers, fundraisers... that come home every week!!

Great post, I was laughing with the familiarity of it!!

Our teachers do home visits once a year and two of our teachers have visited us at home... a little stressful for mom but both my kids loved showing the teacher's their room and treasures and doing an activity just with their teacher!!

Tanya said...

You only get these on Tuesdays??? I get "keep" papers and important notices every time my daughter goes to school!! Oh, and she always finds hers in the trash too. I can't tell you how many times a giant Cookie Monster project from preschool has been resurrected. In fact, I think it's still hanging on the back of her brother's bedroom door.

Valarie Lea said...

I have had to learn to throw away some of the papers when no one is home and taking the garbage out immediatly :)

Patois42 said...

We have Friday folders, and, sad sap that I am, I keep nearly everything, putting them into binders. At the start of the next school year, I cull the 8 or 9 binders down into one. I used to feel sad doing it, but, by the third one, I'm ready to rip straight through the kindergarten one.

Connie said...

So this is what I have to look forward to. Where do you put the 'keep' items?

I need to relearn cursive. I had to write a check to the dishwasher repair man today and it looks like a 5 year old wrote it. I have forgotten how to write...I am a printing kind of gal.

D... said...

Your daughter has lovely handwriting! My son is currently in 5th grade and hasn't been taught! I'm taking it upon myself to teach him and I'm meeting resistance from him.

We have Tuesday folders here too. I used to keep everything. Then, I realized I was falling behind in organizing it and we were running out of room. Now I only keep the cute stuff. Luckily, the older they get, the less cute stuff there is. Whew!

Teacher visit? Gulp.

Faith said...

Too funny!

As a special ed teacher I send home papers in the Friday Folder (just sounds so much better doesn't it???) and at my youngest daughter's school papers come home little by little each day. she is a bit OCD so is constantly correcting...which is nice that a bunch don't pile up!

Your daughter has very good handwriting!

Anonymous said...

OH YES...the dreaded TUESDAY folder, that NEVER seems to make it home on TUESDAY...usually around THURSDAY, my son rushes in from school and unzips his backpack as fast as he can to dutifully show me the folder, and have me sign it. Because I can't just LOOK....I have to SIGN that I LOOKED.

And then.....*THE PAPERS*...I think angels must be singing in the background as he hands them to me, he holds them with such REVERENCE! And yes, I too, get the LOOK, and then the TEARS if he finds even ONE paper in the trash.

I've learned the art of LYING. *EEK!* run away...run away.....I know, that's awful. But I put them away til he's asleep and then take them right out to the big trashcan outside. I keep some, like you, then toss the rest....and then the next morning, when he asks where his papers are, I tell him they are in his school folder in the filing cabinet to keep them safe, which he LOVES.

And that gets me off the hook. I've been lucky he has NEVER asked to SEE this said file in the cabinet that doesn't exist, but holds EVERY paper ever done by him in school leading up to his 4th grade year....

Oh the Tuesday folder....

Joy said...

That was LOL funny!

Alexia said...

LOL Your son sounds like my brother. I help him "organize" (which really stands for clean out) his room every one in awhile and he will have PILES of school papers that he is supposed to be saving...for what, I'm never quite sure.

Tressa & Mark said...

Don't know if someone already suggested this...

Our youngins' each have their own box for school papers. Once it gets full, they get to choose which papers are tossed to allow room for more.

gina said...

First of all the "top of the trash" is where you went wrong- you've got to HIDE that stuff under a few layers in the trash. I have one magnet for each child on the fridge. Each child is in charge of hanging what they want , when they want on the fridge. They know if they don't hang it it gets tossed. With the exception of SEASONAL arts and crafts- they get displayed for the season then tossed. They don't mind because they know the IMPORTANT things to them they have control over saving.


And the teacher is coming to your house?!??