“By the way, I need a brown shirt for school today.”

My daughter said this ever so casually as we were walking out the door, five minutes before school started.

“You what?” I asked incredulously. “Remember, the play today? I need to look like a hamster.” She actually smiled.

I had to put everything down and hyperventilate for a moment. Had I missed some notice?

Her: “The teacher said to tell you.”

“When did she say this?”

“Last week sometime.”

My daughter has an entire wardrobe in every shade of pink. Feminists be damned, in her opinion.

“Why do you mention this as we’re going out the door?” I might have been shouting, just a little.

Her: “I forgot.”

Counting off the seconds before we were well and truly late, I dashed back into her room and began frantically tossing clothes out of her drawers, like the crazy slacker mother that I am.

Fuchsia, flamingo pink, baby pink, red, Barbie pink ...

“Ah ha!” I held up something in a tangerine. “Will this do?”

She shrugged. “It doesn’t really say hamster.”

She fished a brown shirt out of the pile I’d created.

This shirt was second hand, had long sleeves and a fleece jacket sewn to it.

“It’s 80 degrees,” I pointed out. “You’ll be hot.”

She said: “Fur, perfect!”

Miraculously we had something.

Finally, we were in the car on the way to school, my sweaty little hamster and I.

I said as sweetly as humanly possible: “Please don’t wait until we’re walking out the door to mention things like that. Mummy needs time to find things.”

“Okay,” she said solemnly. “I need peach tights for dance recital practice tonight.”

I suppose I should be flattered my daughter thinks I’m a magician.