First Day......

August 30th marked the first day of Kindergarten for Taylor, and the first day of Preschool for Zach. For the most part, things went really well! The night before school we read the book "Twas the night before Kindergarten" to Taylor, and we read "Courdory goes to School" to Zach. They both loved the books, wanted me to read them over and over again, and were so excited about the next day! Bags were packed, outfits were picked out and all we needed to do was get a good night's sleep.. Oh, and wake up a few hours earlier the next morning. :) The morning went off pretty smoothly; Ben came home to go with us and we were off at 8:10 a.m.! Once we arrived at School, Taylor started to get nervous. This wasn't really a big surprise to me; she is a lot like me as a child in new situations, and she tends to get herself a little anxious. We dropped Zach off at his classroom first, and he was as calm as could be... he went right over to a table and started playing. I hugged him, told him "Mommy is going to leave" and he never looked back. I was a lot less emotional about dropping him off then I was 2 years ago when I first took Taylor. I think it might have to do with being so familiar with the school.. and honestly, it's only 5 hours of school each week. Anyway.. next we took Taylor to Kindergarten. This is where things were a tad bit overwhelming.. most of the kids were already in class, so that was a little intimidating and they had all of these bins with school supplies, so we had to go through all the things we brought and put them in the appropriate bin. I especially loved it when her teacher said to me "the first day of school can be a little overwhelming for everyone". Do you think it showed on me? ha! Then, we had to find Tayl0r's locker and get it all situated.. (by the way, I'm not going to name- names, but I actually saw a Mom at school today who was putting a locker organizer in her child's locker... can you say over the top? I don't think my locker was that nice in High School?) So, after putting her things away we had to find her assigned seat.. and say our goodbyes. This is where Taylor completely lost it. She started crying, and hanging on to me. I bent down to remind her of the things we had been talking about. That she wasn't alone, that God was with her. We talked about if we were feeling shy and lonely, the best thing to do was go find another friend who looked like they didn't have anyone to talk too because they were probably feeling the same way. (All things by the way, that I need to work on as an adult.. but we don't really want our kids to carry on our weaknesses, right?) So, none of our reminders were working, she was crying and clinging, and her teacher had to physically pick her up and pull her away from me. So, yes it was rough. :) After school, Mrs. Mohler told me the crying had lasted for about a minute and she was fine for the rest of the day. Today was her second day, and we had no problems. She proclaimed it was a "great day"!! Zach seemed to also have a great first day.. although, every time I ask him about it he gives me an answer that has nothing to do with school... Hmmm. It's so hard to believe we are in "real" school now. I'm not sure how we got here. In some ways the past 5 years seem like 10, but in some ways they have gone by so fast. This October, it will be 2 years that I have been home full time with the kids, and we have all learned a lot! :) We are going to miss Summer, but we are all looking forward to what this year will bring.

Our tradition, signs for the first day.

Bags packed and ready to go!
The Kindergartner... by the way, did I mention she can now tie her shoes? So proud of her.


Together... Zach refusing to look, of course!
Zach in his classroom.
Look at my little guy? He didn't even look back!