Festival of Trees Field Work

The field trip from Hades. Outer Darkness. Hellfire and Brimstone. You get the point.

Ethan and Annie's classes did a service project and made some cartons and donated candy to sell at the Festival of Trees to raise money for Primary Children's. So their teachers thought it would be nice for them to go there to see their cute projects for sale and find out more about what they raised money for. Doesn't that all sound so nice? Like it would be a great experience for the kids? Excuse me while I pick myself up off the floor. I'm not sure if I had a seizure triggered by the memory or if I just convulsed from laughter. Let's continue.

Let me explain that charter schools do not have buses. So, for most field work, parents drive. Well, this time the teachers had a brilliant idea. They got together and planned (or was it plotted? Hmmmm.) on a different mode of transportation. Public transportation. Sounds like a good idea, no? NO. Let me repeat, in case you were unclear. When you are taking 150 children to Salt Lake City from Marriot-Slaterville, public transportation is not your best bet.

The plan was to catch Front Runner in Ogden, and then take Trax to the South Town Expo Center for the Festival of Trees. We left the school around 8:40 to catch the Front Runner at about 9:15. This part wasn't too bad. Front Runner was pretty roomy. But Front Runner only goes so far. At 10:15 we got off Front Runner, and on to Trax. For FORTY MINUTES. In 3 cars. With 150 kids and countless teachers and chaperones. Have you ever been on Trax? It's fine. For 10 minutes. By yourself. When there are empty seats to sit in. My only moment of gratefulness came in feeling sorry for the poor people who had brought their younger children on this field work. And strollers. And diaper bags. It was a freaking nightmare. There was literally no room to move or breathe. The poor people who were just taking Trax to work like they do every day didn't know what hit them.

That would have been bad enough. But I was also carrying 5 lunches for me and my group, and I was about 4 months pregnant. And then we finally get to the dang festival, and they hand us the itinerary. We had one hour there. After all that travel - ONE HOUR. And we had to eat lunch and see everything during that time. And then do the whole ride again. Kill me now.

So we eat, and glance at a couple trees, and head back to the train o' death. And it was just as fun going back! And Front Runner wasn't even as easy this time, since there is one bathroom on board, and one kid from my group needed it, along with 76 other kids from other groups.

Note to my kids : you should nominate me for sainthood.