Hello all, OP here! :] I must say that I am so surprised that my late night ranting on FML made it on the site. XD Well I thought I'd elaborate a bit. x] First of all, it was a trip with my high school AP European History class to Italy and France. It was all planned out, everything was included in what we pay online, and I already had gotten my passport. I got a part time job early last year when I found out about it to help pay for the trip, and I earned almost $850 to put towards funding it, as well as earned my own spending money. I had to give her the money because the tickets were being paid for from her account. I have no clue what happened to the money I gave my mom for the trip, but for the record she was not supposed to pay for the entire trip. A few days after I gave her the money I had earned, she texted me while I was at school telling me that she had signed me up for the trip and that it was paid for, so I stopped reminding her about it. She had already told me that if I helped earn money for the trip I could go. Secondly, the "I gave up Christmas" part referred to the fact that I agreed with my parents that I would be willing to give up getting presents on Christmas this year and the last to somewhat make up for the money they were putting towards this trip. On Christmas last year I got nothing, but I was fine with it because I was expecting to be going on this trip. They didn't tell me then that I wasn't going, they just didn't get me anything and let me keep believing. Thirdly, by "hinting", I literally just meant occasionally hinting that I wanted to go on the trip. I left the brochure laying around, forwarded emails from my teacher about fundraising options, mentioned it when my mother asked about my day at school etc. Anyone who knows me knows I'm a dang coward about inconveniencing people, never asking for things, never getting in people's way and always trying to avoid causing them trouble.. But when I realized I really wanted to go on this trip, I went about hinting about it, I wouldn't say that I was pestering her all that much. x] I did remind her about paying, but only after she told me I could go if I got a job to help pay for it. :P On the bright side, at least I have the spending money I saved up. :P