Last spring during Hadley’s class camping trip to the Sand Dunes, I learned a little somethin’: Hadley is that girl who likes to tease the boys.
I was never that girl. In fact if there was a boy I liked, I was so nervous around them that I’d usually resort to corporal punishment. As you can imagine, that made me realllly popular with the boys.
It’s no wonder I didn’t get married until my 30s.
But much to our mortification, Hadley has that teasing and flirting thing down in fifth grade.
The other day, I saw her swipe J.D.’s (the cutest boy in class) backpack and dump it on a pile of manure.
Her defense? “He did it to my skirt!”
Then, her new teacher actually had to issue a ban on her putting grasshoppers down the boys’ shirts. We had a good talking to about appropriate behavior and I thought we had gotten through to her.
But then came the kicker the other day. “Hadley was pinching my butt today,” tattled a boy in our carpool.
I couldn’t believe it but later that night, we had another chat.
“Is it true you’re pinching boys’ butts?”
“You told me to stop putting grasshoppers down people’s shirts. But you didn’t tell me to stop pinching their butts.”
Her teenage years might just do me in.
I'm a Canadian-born mom of two, former Denver Post columnist, family travel writer, editor of MileHighMamas.com and 9News contributor. Expert on all things Utah, Denver, family and travel. Lover of laughter and life. Happily married to a man obsessed with growing The Great Pumpkin. 