I’m so proud today. Bug won her very first coloring contest.

I didn’t even know there was a contest. You’d think with something big like this she’d come home and tell me all about it. I mean, we LOVE coloring in this house. It’s our one big thing that we always do together, every day. You’d think maybe we could brain storm on ideas and practice on our own versions at home or something.

Nope. Not a peep from Bug. I did not know anything about it.

I do remember a few weeks ago at a movie night function that they hosted at school, one of the teachers mentioned that the t-shirt contestants had their t-shirt designs hung up in the library along with all the science projects and we were welcome to go look at them. Bug and I made our way over to the library. We looked at the science projects and even sat down and read a book together but not once did she mention the t-shirt coloring contest. I figured it was for the older grades and really didn’t even bother looking at them. I think there might have been some paper t-shirts hung in the window but nothing caught my eye.

So today when I’m picking Bug up from school and I overhear one of the teachers telling another parent that their child won third place in the t-shirt coloring contest, my ears perked up. A coloring contest? For kindergarteners? How did I not know about this? Such things are so very near and dear to my heart! In fact, all these years one of my biggest claims to fame is how I won the school-wide haunted house coloring contest in second grade!! I may have even used it as a bullet point on a resume or two.

I turned to Bug with question-mark-eyes popping out of my head.

“Oh,” she says matter-of-factly as she unzips her backpack and hands me a blue ribbon. “I won first place and they gave me a free book.”

Kids. Sheesh.