A member of my homeschooling group put out an invitation for a field trip to a ballet performance of Don Quixote at the end of the month. I’ve never taken the boys to a play or ballet because I didn’t believe they’d sit and enjoy it. But this sounded like the ideal first exposure…short, about a man, and a matinee performance with other kids in the audience. So I decided we should go.

Then I told the boys that I’d signed us up to see a ballet and was shocked at their reaction. Faces crumpled up in horror, and the two older ones were nearly in tears when I figured it out.

“I signed us up to SEE a ballet. Not to BE in one.”

Everyone was very relieved. I retired to another room to laugh.

Image courtesy of davidyuweb via Creative Commons license, some rights reserved.

Earnest Parenting: help for parents who might not want their children to learn ballet.