First Day of School - Take #2

The Tumbleweed finally got to head back to school after the original first day was canceled due to Irene-related damage. It was a little strange to have the first day of school called off!

The Tumbleweed had gotten to tour her new classroom the Friday before. She was excited to see the names of the other kids in her class, and she has several friends in her class. I was glad to get some pictures of her at school because I don't get to do that very often :)




Once First Day #2 came, she was pretty eager to go to school. We were ready about 20 minutes early to do pictures before the bus came. As usual, she was a cooperative model. The bus came and picked her up going the other direction, foiling my 'get-on-the-bus-turn-and-wave' picture. Then she was off to Second Grade!





It was a long wait until the bus brought her back. I think it was a little easier than last year, but it was so hard to wait! She gave a thorough description of her teacher, describing her as, "She looks like Auntie but she has curly hair in a pony tail. She was wearing a red dress with white polka dots." And finally, "She looks like she is 21, but she isn't." LOL. And that was most of what we got out of her about how the day went.

She didn't have homework, yet but when she got home she found her desk had been cleared and re-arranged by the "homework fairy". She wasn't too thrilled about this, but seemed to accept it. I am interested to see what second grade homework looks like!

Preschool 2

The Dandelion has been waiting rather impatiently for his first day of "Preschool 2". We spent a lot of time at the gymnastics center, where his preschool is located, over the summer and we would often run into to the Dandelion's classmates who were in summer daycare or camps there. Some days we would even see his teachers passing through the lobby and they would tell him how they were getting the classroom ready for him. He was quite excited to go to the upstairs classroom (for the older preschoolers) and even more excited to eat his lunch at school.

Fortunately for him, his school starts earlier than most schools, including the Tumbleweed. He got dressed and ready to go very quickly for orientation day and even mostly cooperated for pictures.



Once at school he jumped right in playing with his buddies from last year. He was rather disappointed when I told him I was staying with him the whole time. He wanted to go back as soon as we left --- which was complicated by the fact that we did go back for the Tumbleweed's gymnastics practice just a few hours later.

Finally two days later, he got to go back for the whole day. He was surprisingly easy going about being dropped off, especially considering that he cried and/or whined when being dropped off most of last year. And even though his best buddy did not come that day, he was eager to stay at school and eat lunch there. At the end of the day he reported that his favorite parts of school were "lunch and recess" and that he had a new "best friend" (a little girl in his class). Sounds like school is a success so far.

Make Your Own Fun

Last night we read a story to the kids about how it is their responsibility to "make their own fun", meaning it isn't anyone else's job to find them something to do if they are bored. It had been a rainy day with a larger number of squabbles and "boredom" episodes, so this seemed fitting.

The Tumbleweed had heard the lesson before (from "7 Habits of Happy Kids"), but this was the first time the Dandelion had heard it. And of course he has already tried it out. This morning he was up before 7:00, which meant he was supposed to go back to sleep and not wake me up. Actually, both kids came and asked for breakfast at 6:25, but were sent back to their rooms.

Two hours later, I discovered what the Dandelion had done to keep himself busy.


He emptied every book off his bookshelves, every stuffed animal out of the bins, and took out a bunch of toys from the toy box.

This comes on the heels of his comment last night while putting away his laundry, "some things are re-ranged, in case that makes you confused". I guess he has decided it is time for a room clean out, because seeing it all lying on the floor makes it look like an awful lot (especially when it has to be cleaned up at once).

Back to Blogging

It is almost time to head back to school and we have been crazy busy since I last posted (beginning of June!?!?). The end of the school year was hectic as all of our activities all came to a close within about a week and we jumped right into summer, with about a million things we wanted to do. So as the kids get ready to go back to school, I am getting ready to get back to blogging and record our memories of the past couple months before I forget.

My blog topic to do list:

1- SuperKids Triathlon
2- Spring Soccer Season
3- Insanity Day
4- Last Day of 1st Grade
5- Preschool 1 Graduation
6- "Insanity Day"
7- Gymnastics Shows
8- Dandelion Turns 4
9- Dance Recital
10- Inky Fingers
11- 4th of July Weekend
12- Patriot Place
13- Girl Scout Camp
14- Picking Fruit
15- Summer Gymnastics
16- Davis Farmland
17- Soccer Camp
18- New Hampshire Vacation
19- Flat Juliette Visits
20- Haunted City Junior Triatlon
21- Lost Tooth #2

There are probably a few more things but there are at least 21 things I want to remember to remember...

Deadline: September 15th - one month from today, a little over 2 weeks after the kids start school and my childhood friend Kim's birthday (funny how some dates just stick in your head, isn't it?).