For years I have scrolled through my Facebook feed and loved the efforts of parents and kids in creating spectacular, ingenious and just lovely costumes for World Book Day. From comic books to classics, one off faves and quirky childhood favourites, kids everywhere were living the dream and I couldn’t wait until my kids were in school and we could embrace this wonderful idea too.
Then this year we finally got a chance to. Megan briefly wanted to be Cinderella but then never really swayed from being a rabbit from Peter Rabbit, and Ethan was set on being The Gruffalo… No the big skeleton from Funny Bones…no Sam I am..No green ham…no Aliens love underpants…definitely a skeleton..Okay the robber from cops and robbers! It was far from the fun easy adventure I had anticipated as we enjoy so many great books and my son is evidently as indecisive as me. In the end he settled on a Cops and Robbers (Grabber Dan to be precise), and we had a few last minute costume makes, and then Megan was a gorgeous Lily Rabbit. I just loved that moment they saw themselves for the first time in character – so exciting!
And then me with my bright ideas suggested in our PTA meeting a few weeks back that we dress up too and share some stories with the classes in school which was embraced well, and subsequently evolved into me sharing one to the whole school in an assembly – Score..nooottt!
I rocked up to school dressed as Peg Polka dot from “The Troll” complete with frying pan and plastic fish and had great fun reading to reception whilst the other mum’s tackled the other classes. Then the school gathered in the hall where I shared (in my dressing gown) one of our faves “Zagazoo” in Assembly to hall of eager kids and teachers.
I do love to perform, it makes me happy. I am a little eccentric at times, and wish I dare be more so sometimes, But I do feel comfortable being a character and acting, and to do this for my kids school is a moment I will remember for a long time. Not just that but that moment in the morning when they looked in the mirror and saw themselves in character! It was so precious and it felt so good to be silly with them and embrace this opportunity of being a school mum on the PTA on world book day. Its was so much fun and so many giggles.
Our first world book day was easily a success and I found it a wonderful thing for me to share this with the kids too. I think it was good for them to see me in their school life and me them. To be in Megan’s class and see her grinning “that’s my mum” was certainly a lovely thing. To hear their class mates laughing their heads off and thinking I’m a rather cool mum (I hope ha) was just great for us all, and we left school on such a high… they had loved being dressed up and sharing their books with their friends. They had appreciated differences in likes and dislikes and had loved the chance to have a day celebrating the wonderful world of books and stories. A day to exercise imagination and passion, and an ordinary moment of childhood we embraced wholeheartedly – roll on next year!
They look amazing in their outfits and I love that you got to join in too – they must have loved that! I’m much more introvert and dressing up is my idea of hell. I envy anyone who can stand in front of an audience in character x
Donna recently posted…Chewy Moon Review and Giveaway!