Homecoming Traditions

The word “Homecoming” always invokes memories of crisp fall days, crystal clear blue skies, golden cornfields, cheerleaders, football jerseys, parades, paper-mache class floats, fire engines, flying candy, screaming children, decorated gymnasiums, school dances, and Homecoming coronations.

That is the Homecoming of my childhood.  I remember getting out of school and standing along the parade route in front of my elementary school, screaming and shouting for the cheerleaders or football players to throw candy my way…wanting so badly to be a cheerleader when I grew up.

In high school, I remember decorating my mom’s little Fiat convertible and riding in the Homecoming parade with my friend, Brenda.  We wore matching maroon and white striped hooded sweaters, sat on the back of the car and waved and threw candy at the crowd.  As a senior, I was a member of Student Council and spent a week decorating the gymnasium with tissue paper.  I never worked on my class float, but I was always proud of the work that went in to it, and every year, I stood with my fellow band members on the football field and twirled my flag with every ounce of school pride I had.

I loved Homecoming, and I still love Homecoming.  It is always a magical time of the year for me.  As an adult, I have often made the long journey back to my hometown to celebrate Homecoming with my friends.  I’ve learned you can be goofier as an adult at these celebrations because you no longer worry about peer pressure and what others think of you.

Now that I am a Texan, and live in the land where high school football and Friday Night Lights is the thing of legends, I was rather disappointed in Homecoming.  As the big day approached, I started quizzing Elliott, who is a freshman this year, what the Homecoming festivities entailed.  Was there a dance?  Is there a parade?  Are there class floats, and candy throwing, and marching bands?

The answer…No…No…No…No…and not really.

Seriously?  No parade?  No dance?  Somehow Friday Night Lights was turning out to be rather, well…boring.

The big thing here that everyone, and I mean EVERYONE gets excited about is the Homecoming mum.  When Elliott first told me about these mums, I thought of big white fluffy mum corsages, tastefully pinned to the shoulders of girls attending a Homecoming dance.  But since there wasn’t a Homecoming dance, what was the point in wearing a flower corsage?

Elliott, through the high school coconut telegraph, couldn’t tell me much more than that they were a BIG deal and she wanted one.  I called my mother because a decade earlier, my parents lived in Allen, TX.  She immediately knew what I was talking about except she said they were these big, ugly, gaudy things that all the girls wore to school.  OK, that didn’t help.  So, I asked my Texas born and raised husband.  He said they were these big, ugly, gaudy things that all the girls wore to school.  No more information than that, except that we needed to get one for Elliott.

Taking away from my conversations that the mums were a big deal and I needed to provide one for my daughter, I decided to go to the source and find out what the big deal was.  I drove to the local flower shop, took a deep fortifying breath, and went inside to inquire about a Homecoming mum.

The owner of The Flower Patch was very nice and when I told her I was new in town, new to Texas, and needed help in understanding the Homecoming mum, she was more than willing to jump in and teach me all the ins and outs of this particular Homecoming tradition.

First of all, the Homecoming mum is not made with a real flower, it is made with an artificial flower so it can be saved and preserved throughout the ages.  And apparently, it’s not just the high school girls that wear the artificial floral concoctions but also little girls as young as kindergarteners participate in the tradition.  There are also headbands and garters to round out these emblems of school pride.

I discovered the mums are less about the flower and more about the ribbons and trinkets that go on the arrangement.  They are not just simple artificial floral corsages, they are these huge monstrosities that require advanced hot glue gun skills and yards of school color inspired ribbon.

And they are not cheap.  One peacock inspired mum with feathers, glitter, and with at least 20 yards of ribbon was $65.  Seriously?  For that kind of money, I could have wielded my own hot glue gun for a fraction of the price…that is if I knew exactly what packing box my glue gun was located in.  And for our first Homecoming in Texas, maybe I should learn the ropes before firing up my own glue gun.

On the advice of the flower shop owner, I brought both Elliott and Hunter in one day after school so they could pick out their own Homecoming mums.  When Elliott wanted to buy the $65 peacock inspired mum, I told her she could buy it herself, otherwise I would pay for a moderately priced arrangement. 

The girls spent a lot of time inspecting each of the dozens of mums that were pre-made and ready for personalized embellishment.  There were racks of mums, racks of ribbons, racks of garters, and boards filled with plastic trinkets, bells and bows. 

As the girls were browsing, I observed another mother picking out a mum for her daughter.  I stood quietly by watching as she discussed ribbon colors with her daughter, what exact trinkets should be added, where she wanted extra bows placed, and the exact angle the cheerleading megaphone should be placed inside the mum.  I am not a big fan of the uber-mother, but watching her lead her daughter around the flower shop with the precision of an army general, I started to realize how BIG an actual deal this tradition really was.  Although I might not understand the tradition, and I might spend great amounts of time mocking it, it is a time honored tradition in this small Texas town and if I wanted my daughters to fit into their new schools and form their own traditions and memories, then I needed to play the game, fork over my credit card, and keep my snide comments to myself.

The girls finally decided on their mums, picked out the appropriate amount of accouterments, then I paid and made arrangements for them to be delivered to the schools on the appropriate day.  To say they were excited would be an understatement.

The Friday of Homecoming dawned bright and clear, with an actual nip in the air, and the girls were so excited to get to school and receive their mums.  Before I could even drop Elliott off at the high school, I could see girls walking across the parking lot with Homecoming mums pinned to their shirts and ribbons floating around their knees and thighs.  Minutes after dropping Elliott off, I received a text from her saying, “OMG!  It’s mumcoming!!!”

Homecoming mums might not be the tradition of my childhood.  I may spend the rest of my life missing crisp fall days, crystal clear blue skies, golden cornfields, cheerleaders, football jerseys, parades, paper-mache class floats, fire engines, flying candy, screaming children, decorated gymnasiums, school dances, and Homecoming coronations, but Homecoming mums are a tradition of my children’s childhood and one I need to embrace rather that mock.

I just hope I can find the packing box that my hot glue gun is located in before Homecoming next year.