First Day of Kindergarten!

Last night we had Reid's favorite dinner (quinoa bites, shrimp, and watermelon). Then we spent a good fifteen minutes wrestle-fighting daddy. Once we calmed down and got all ready for bed, Reid was given a special Father's Blessing for the beginning of his Kindergarten school year. 

He was blessed with an increased desire to learn and to understand new concepts. There were many beautiful phrases in there about gaining knowledge and interpreting strategies for problem solving. He was also blessed to be kind and to remember that others will follow his example when he chooses the right. I'm not sure how much he understood at this age, when I asked what his favorite thing Daddy said was, he simply answered "Kindergarten." At least it's a good family tradition to start! 

Nell keeps asking if everything will be the same when she goes to school. "Will I get a sign to hold, too?" "Daddy will give me a special blessing too, right mama?" We had to go find a family photo for Reid to take to school this morning and so I gave one to Coraline and Nell as well. You can see them holding them in the picture below. They sure are anxious to be just like Reid one day!

I already shared the details of the two above photos on Facebook, but here it goes again. During one of Reid's last units of study in 4K they planted marigold seeds. When he had his end of year program we brought the seedling home and put it in our back flowerbed. I never expected it to grow so tall. Didn't know marigolds could! It just started blooming about a week ago, and I thought that was very fitting for his start to Kindergarten.

Here's the poem his teacher included with the flower:


As for the bus picture, well I really just wanted a photo of Reid getting on the school bus, but when I went to take it the door swung open and Bob gave us all a big hello. I was so happy to see Bob, Reid's afternoon bus driver from last year. Some of my clearest and favorite early childhood education memories are of my own bus ride to and from school. I was blessed to have the same bus driver year after year after year. Even when I stopped riding the bus during my teen years I still regularly rode Katie's bus to school events in other cities. She probably just liked taking the girls athletic teams to their events, but I also secretly hoped she enjoyed watching me and who I'd become. I got this hunch when she drove our MoDel (school Newspaper) team to our own competitions. She was always so kind and so happy to see me. She made me feel special and I'm grateful for that simple service.

These photos are of Reid being the DINO-BOT 3000. I took him to the store yesterday and told he and Nell they could each pick out one shirt. I was really there to have Nell try on a few things so I knew what size to buy her Fall/Winter clothes. While we were looking at the girl stuff Reid wondered over to the boy side and found this shirt. He was so excited to show it to me! He couldn't wait to wear it for his first day of school.

He is also very excited that his good friend Liviana is going to be on his bus and his other good friend Ben is in his class! Not only that, they even sit at the same table!

After we put Reid on the bus we headed over to the school for a PTA Boohoo/Yahoo breakfast. Though he'd only been gone about 10 minutes, Nell was already missing him. We had a little chat about why she couldn't act sad when she saw Reid again. And she did really well. Once we spotted him she ran to him and gave him a big hug. He smiled and seemed happy to see us at his school. I asked if I could take one more picture and he and Ben posed right away. Then I decided to stand off to the side with the other parents, to give him his space. Nell didn't like this and asked why she couldn't go talk to her brother, so I told her she could. On that second approach I could tell Reid was embarrassed. "Nell," he kind of smile-groaned. So I called her name and we headed inside.

While sitting on the gym floor eating a sprinkle covered, chocolate frosted doughnut Nell lost herself. She just started sobbing about how much she missed her brother. It was sweet, and I suddenly realized that rather than having one less kid (Yahoo!) I actually had a kid who would suddenly demand a lot more attention (Boohoo) without her big brother around to entertain her.

Throughout the day we talked about her new role as the oldest kid at home ("Until Reid gets back, right mama?). I'm hoping she quickly realizes she is now the leader of all our free play time. We'll see how it goes.

I knew I wanted to record Reid getting off the bus because I remembered their sweet hug from earlier in the morning and the adorable hug from his first day of 4K last year. Reid kind of surprised me by dodging Nell, but he did hug both his sisters (with a big smile on his face) in the end.

He immediately told me, "Kindergarten is awesome! I had a lot of fun!" When I asked what his favorite part was he said, without hesitation, "Lunch. I scarfed down those quinoa bites and shrimp!" He was very excited to see old friends and make new ones. I think we will have a very successful year.