The School Year Officially Begins!

Officially off to school and excited about it! Collins did great at drop-off, and Mom and Dad did a little better too. :)

First day pick-up...

Me- "What was your favorite part of your day, sweetie?"

Collins- "I forgot."

Me- "Okay, what was your least favorite part of the day?"

Collins- "When you forgot to pack me a water bottle, and I was really thirsty."

Umm, major parent fail? I felt terrible. And then when I asked her who she sat with at lunch time, and she said, "no one", I felt even more terrible.

It's a good thing I had the idea to buy her a cake to celebrate her first day of school...that somewhat made up for the dehydration earlier in the day!

Here is her own assessment of her first day of school...

But then on the second day pick-up, the first thing out of her mouth was "I made a new friend today!" Talk about making a mama feel better instantly. I was so relieved!

But now a few weeks later...WOW is all I can say! Apparently, I did not underestimate the big change that kindergarten would be. It was a wild first few weeks of elementary school, with me feeling like we were on an emotional rollercoaster. The first three weeks, she had very high highs and very low lows and a lot of meltdowns in between.

High highs

• Coming home from school and wanting to play "school". Collins was the teacher of course, and turns out a pretty strict one. She would say things she heard her teacher say like, "Class, class!", and Addie and I would have to respond (immediately), "Yes, yes!". She'd ask us, "Do you know how to write the number "100"? And then she'd draw a picture of an amazing shark and Jumping Jim from Letterland. It was obvious from her "lesson" that she was absorbing a ton of new information.
• As I was doing laundry one night and Collins was in the bath, I overheard her saying to herself, "one nation under God". She was reciting part of the Pledge of Allegiance! A couple days later when we were playing school, she recited the entire thing. You should seen Brian's face as she went through the whole thing. A proud moment for Daddy!
• As she and Brian were doing her first week of homework assignments, she read a sentence with Brian and then saying, "Mommy, I can read!"
• Coming home so excited about her first ever pep rally (for Fall Festival)- "Mom, you sell raffle tickets and you can win a trip to Disney or headphones!"
• Being out for dinner and seeing a period in the restaurant and saying, "That is a period- it ends a sentence."
• Telling Addie, "Addie, you don't really learn anything in preschool. You don't even have your own desk and all you do all day is play." :)
• So much energy/excitement leaving school that she literally skipped home from school.

Low lows

• Getting hit in the face with a soccer ball during recess
• Frustrations in computer lab because she cannot figure out the program
• Kids in class sharing scary stories and her not being able to sleep because of the hammer man that comes into your room at night if you are not sleeping and hammers nails into your head (I know...terrible right?)
• Complaints of tummy aches and headaches for first time in her life (because of anxiety)
• Meltdowns upon getting home from school from being so tired- snapping when I asked her to put her shoes in the shoe basket and acting like a crazy person screaming and crying

I am relieved to say these extreme moods have evened out....thank goodness. She does still bolt out of school with an alarming out of energy every day. Which is part of the reason I enjoy walking to school to get her so she can walk/skip/scooter some of that energy out on the way home.

In this moment, she was literally running and pushing the double BOB along which is not so easy to do...

and here she is scootering home. She and Addie attempt to take turns, and it takes us awhile to get there, but I think it's fun that we're within walking distance of school.

The one other issue with kindergarten? Fitting in all we want to do when she gets home from school. This has been pretty hard when she wants to have a snack, watch a show, play by herself, play with us, be outside, read books, take a gymnastics class, etc. This doesn't include the mandatory homework, dinner and bath! I have been letting her take the lead on what she wants to do in her four free hours away from school each day, but it's not been easy to adjust to this smaller time frame of free time. It's getting better though.

Overall, bottom line for us. Kindergarten has been a hard adjustment, but a really cool one. She is learning so much when she is there, she is making new friends, and she is getting empowered by all of this. Now that we are (hopefully) adjusted, I am excited about what is ahead for her!