I absolutely hate filling out forms for my children, especially when they’re redundant. And, as any parent who has put their child into camp, or has registered their child for kindergarten, or enrolled their child in before/after care knows, you get a million and one forms, all slightly different, but many asking for the exact same information. Why? It’s maddening.

Last year, I completely failed on the summer camp forms. At the time of enrollment I was given the forms, but got so frustrated and overwhelmed that I put them aside. Then, work got so busy and all of a sudden it was a few weeks before camp and I was left scrambling to get the medical forms in so my son could start camp on day one. I quickly learned that the pediatrician’s office does not like you coming in last minute looking for forms, but they agreed to do me a favor just that once.

This year, in an attempt not to repeat last year’s huge mom faux pas or piss off the admin at my pediatrician, I made a reminder in my phone to get the forms done. All of the camp forms are online this year, seemingly making it easier. But, this year I have two children in camp and there are so many forms that I gave up working on them after an hour. After writing the same emergency contact information on the 6th form, I decided to tap out. Here’s an idea, instead of having me fill it out over and over again, just refer back to form 1 for the emergency contact. I can feel my blood pressure rising just talking about it.

Before completely giving up, I made sure to print out the medical forms and put another reminder in my phone to head to the pediatrician’s office for a morning when I knew I could be in to work late. You see, the doctor’s office doesn’t open until 9 and I’m expected to be in at 8:30, but I digress. So, later that week I went into the doctors office but realized once I got there that I didn’t fill out the top portion of the forms. I took a seat and made sure to complete my portion of the forms. Once finished, I approached the window and as I said hello to the admin I felt extremely proud of myself that I was so ahead of schedule this year. But, as I began to hand her the form she told me that they no longer fill out the forms. They too, apparently, have gone to an online system. She began to explain that I would need to set up an online account and could access the forms there.

That was it. Done. My hands, thrown, air. So, here I am, about three weeks out from camp and I’m tasked with finalizing these damn camp forms once again….late. There’s always next year!