Hey, this one is for the parents of school-age kids. It’s that time of year again – field trip permission slips, summer camp forms, updating sports physicals, and the list goes on. Sometimes I wonder if it would just be easier to keep my kids WITH me 24/7, to avoid filling out all these forms. Well, would it? (The answer is NO, of course not! Kids need fun experiences and I need them to not be bored for three months out of the year).
Most of the time, we are sent permission slips for activities, right? By this point I *almost* have my kids’ pediatrician’s street address memorized. And maybe I’ll remember our health insurance group number by the time our youngest graduates high school. These forms are a necessary part of transferring authority and help in case of emergency even if they’re a pain to fill out.
Well, what if your kiddo is spending a week with the grandparents, or traveling with an aunt or uncle or family friend? You can and should send them with a consent form giving the responsible adult the authority to get them medical care, just in case. There’s no need to get into the what-if scenarios here (because parents are pretty good at that on our own am I right?) The point is, we can’t predict every part of the future but we can plan for it. To me this is the essence of peace of mind planning.
If you’d like to keep a Travel Consent Form on hand, check out my Resources page to download it. I’ll be adding more digital files like this in the future, as well.