Those moments in life where you want to say a REALLY ugly word. This is one.

"PAY ATTENTION!" I mouthed to Caroline at tennis lessons the other night.

She had done so well.

"Wow!  Caroline is really doing great," one mom commented.

"Caroline is really good," another mom said.

Oh, stop it.

She is good.  She likes those one man sports that she only has herself to worry about.

She likes tennis therefore she is pretty good at it.

After such a great lesson, I was confused as to why she wasn't paying attention during the last part of class.

"PAY ATTENTION!  GET THE BALL!" I said a little louder this time.

As soon as it was time for ball pick up, Caroline ran to me with panic on her face.

"Caroline, go pick up the balls with everyone else."

"But MOM!"  She had a chunk of hair in her hand that was caked in gum.

Damn.  This is one of those moments in life where I wanted to say a REALLY ugly word.  Like really ugly.

What am I supposed to do?

I thought for a moment.

I did what any awesome mother would do... I tucked the gum wad/hair wad behind her ear, patted her on the butt and said, "Go back out there.  We will deal with it later."

"BUT MOM!"

"Caroline, I don't have time to deal with it right now.  I have had enough today.  I am over it.  Over.it.  I will deal with it when I get home."

She pushed on the gum to stick it to the back of her ear and ran out on the court to pick up balls.

We came home.

We tried ice.  It didn't work.

I was over it.  "Whatever, I am just going to cut it out."

"MOM NO!"

"Well Caroline, I don't know what else to do."

We went to the bathroom.  I took pictures to document this event.

First gum wad... check.

How did the gum get in her hair you ask?

She says it just fell out of her mouth and landed in her hair.

Nice.

What is even better is the fact that I didn't even know she had gum in her mouth.