The End of An Era

Here we have our traditional stand-on-the-valve-box-photos for back to school complete with early morning squinty eyes and the glare from the sun.

Megan-11th grade

  Luke-8th grade

 Ellie-6th grade

Joshua-3rd grade

 

Drew-1st grade

I have no eloquent essay to explain this monumental day for me as a mother. My children are now all in full-time school.

I have no words.

A Welcome Boost

Volunteering in my children's classrooms isn't one of my favorite things to do.The patience required to work with in a classroom full of grade-school children, often seems beyond the patience limit my personality has. I didn't do it at all during the years I was heavily involved in PTA, but last year and this one, I've given it a valiant effort.

On the mornings I go into Ellie's classroom to volunteer, there is always a journal writing prompt on the screen (note I didn't say chalkboard!) for the children to write about. I always wish I could sit down and write my thoughts from the prompt, but instead I help the struggling students improve their reading scores. (Which even though I said I don't always enjoy volunteering in the classroom, I have loved this assignment. It is very rewarding to see some of these children improve over the weeks. Others break my heart.)

The other day when I walked in, the journal prompt was, "I can't imagine living without..." My immediate thought was "being able to see." I interpreted the assignment as things, rather than people. 

I was pleasantly surprised when Ellie showed up at the table I was at a few minutes later and showed me her assignment...

Love mothering moments like this.

Me and Ellie, Ellie and Me

I have to admit I felt a little nervous when I sat down at Ellie's desk during back-to-school night and had to take a "test."

It was one of those "newly-wed game" kind of ideas, and I had to fill in the blanks, without peeking at the blanks Ellie had previously filled in answering the same questions.

I passed with okay results, and Ellie was thrilled with my correct answers and thoroughly entertained by my mistakes.

I on the other hand, feel offended by one of HER answers.

I play games with that child day in and day out. I can't even begin to count the number of games Ellie and I played during the summer. (We have slowed down since school started, but for the most part, we still play at least 2 games a day.)

But her answer on her favorite inside activity?

Reading!!!!

Whatever.
Total lie.
Total, I-need-to-let-my-brand-new-4th-grade-teacher-think-I-love-to-read-and-that-my-mother-doesn't-have-to-say-each-night-when-she-tucks-me-into-bed, "No! It is reading time, no more games."

Take last night for example when I went into check on her and Megan, after having already tucked them into bed. Ellie was laying in bed playing a hand-held "Bop-it" game when she should have been doing her "favorite indoor activity": READING.

Who is she trying to fool?

To be fair, maybe Ellie forgot about the games with the seriousness of being a big 4th grader, and she is now resolved to read more.

Green and purple are 2 of Megan's favorite colors. Oops, my bad. As for hashbrowns versus all-in-one, it's one and the same. (All-in-one is the Sowby's way of saying hashbrowns, eggs and sausage mixed together.) As for her favorite book? I didn't know she'd ever cracked open "The Secret Garden" that sits on her book shelf. Maybe she likes the pretty picture on the front cover? Besides, I think we were both trying to be "4th-gradish" and not include that really she has always loved "The Very Hungry Caterpillar. If she ever hears me reading it to the little boys, she is over in a hurry to listen to it. That's her real favorite book.

As for her favorite outdoor activity?
Wasn't hard to get that one right.

Another Year

We take back-to-school photos in the exact same spot every year since Megan started 1st grade in 2005. The silly Japanese Maple tree next to them hasn't grown at all over the years, fortunately the children have.

Like I said to Drew as we exited the school on Monday morning, "It's just you and me now." Of course it was said through tears after we left Luke in his 6th grade classroom, Ellie in a 4th grade portable, and Joshua in the 1st grade classroom I left Megan in 8 years ago.

I'd already walked Megan half way to the bus stop an hour or so earlier.

Back to school is a bittersweet time for me. As much as my children make me C.R.A.Z.Y. during the long, lazy days of summer, I do enjoy them. Monday morning as I watched them eat breakfast, I ignored the climbing on the table to reach the syrup and I didn't yell at anyone to remove the backpack from the kitchen table. I didn't even comment on the syrup and powdered sugar that seemed to entirely miss anyone's french toast and went straight on the table instead. I just looked at them and smiled and thought about how much I love them. I thought about how hard it is to send them back to school, despite knowing full well had summer been much longer, it would have certainly done one or more of us in.

As we left the school, Drew asked, "Can we go to the dollar store right now? I really want a fishing 'pool'."(pole) I drove him straight there and promptly bought him the fishing pole he's had his heart set on for weeks, and threw in a couple other purchases for him too.

I feel as though I'm going to find myself bending to the whims of my 4 year old for the duration of this school year. Especially as I hear him playing nearby speaking into a pretend walkie talkie and saying, "Joshua, do you read me? Joshua, are you there?" Of course, Joshua is not responding like he did all summer long. Joshua is instead sitting in a classroom, while Drew plays alone at home.

I think I'll go answer the walkie talkie call-out. I know by now what really matters...

Less dishes getting done, more puzzles put together.
Fewer pieces of furniture getting dusted, more games being played.
Not so much of a rush for the laundry to get switched, patiently reading more books with a child on my lap.

One more year, til they all go to school.
I no longer count the months.

End of an Era

Joshua attended afternoon kindergarten this year. Although we are 'bus eligible' there is no bus to school for PM kindergarten. I drove him to school every day.

Each day after getting out of the car, (the exception being the 5 days this spring that I had to walk him into the school and have the teacher 'peel' him off of me) he would ran as fast as he could to the kindergarten doors. His little "car flame" backpack that covers the whole of his back and half of his bum swinging behind him as his legs kicked up and ran.

Each day it was the same routine: him hop out of the car, say our goodbyes, him close the door, and off he would go. Just as he'd get to the corner to turn, he'd look back and wave. Every single day.

As much as I dislike the kindergarten half day schedule, there is something about having a child finish it that feels sad to me. The end of kindergarten is really the end of an era. To me, 'real school' begins the day a child starts first grade..

As I drove Joshua to kindergarten today, it was just me and him. As he closed the door following our regular routine, he started to run. I became very sentimental (and a little teary) as I realized this was the last day I'd ever see this particular scene, that without really thinking about it before, had become a tender and special part of my days.

I wanted to etch his fast running into kindergarten permanently into my mind, and hold it as a precious mind memory for years to come. Wanting to additionally capture it more permanently than only in my mind, I got out of the car to take a picture. Perhaps sensing my emotional state, Joshua turned around to wave a little earlier than usual, and saw me standing there with a camera in hand.

He never started running again, instead he was too busy questioning what exactly I was doing taking a photo of him.

I didn't try to explain it to him. He wouldn't understand.
Only a mother could.

A Glorified Fork

I AM not a fan of school projects. Remember the days of Megan and her Science Fair projects? I can't stand projects that require more involvement from the parent than the student.

For the last couple of weeks, I have heard Megan talk about a particular project. Every time it seemed it went in one ear, out the other. At the same time, I was vaguely aware of the neighbor girl and a friend spending hours and days working on a project together. (The dad even coming to borrow a saw from Mike.) See? That is my point. If a project requires a POWER TOOL is it probably a little beyond a "student project."

Regardless. Last Thursday night, I finally began to process what exactly Megan had been talking about for days almost 3 weeks.

"Science class"
"Big project"
"Grape smasher"
"7 different machines or systems"
"Due on Monday"

Wait! What?

"It's due on Monday and today is 8pm on a Thursday night?" I ask, with a less than kind tone.
"Ummmm yes. I have been talking about it for weeks, " came Megan's quiet reply.

"Talking about it, isn't the same as doing it. Call Grandpa," came my reply in the same less than kind tone.

While I picked up fresh fruit in the produce section of the grocery store late on Thursday evening. Megan was on the phone requesting my dad's help for her project for 2 hours on Saturday afternoon.

It became much longer than a 2 hour project, and ended up with my dad saying, "It was actually really fun." (After the part where he asked a somewhat rhetorical question, which echoed my sentiments of STUDENT INVOLVED PROJECTS vs PARENT INVOLVED projects. To preserve his innocence, I'll refrain from putting the exact question he asked on here.)

My dad is an engineer, and very smart. So Megan and Grandpa's "Grape Smasher" ended up being pretty top-notch.

Yes, you read that right. The assignment was to make a grape smasher.
I personally would have told her to take a fork. Last time I checked it smashes grapes perfectly fine.

Hours later, with a concerned Drew that his truck was never going to be returned to him, and children gathering to watch, grapes were smashed on the sidewalk.

I must add, that while Megan was gone for hours and I was worrying about my dad spending all his Saturday on a silly school project, Mike asked more than once, "I could have helped her, but nobody asked me."

But then when Mike watched a grape smash before his eyes, he confirmed with 100% clarity that I had been absolutely correct in saying, "Call Grandpa."

Early Learning

(Joshua's Depiction of Thanksgiving 2012)

Yesterday was Joshua's first SEP (parent/teacher conference). He had absolutely no idea what to expect, but I didn't know he didn't and just kept saying things like, "We have to leave soon for your SEP" or "Let's go now. It's time for your SEP."

As Joshua and I got in the car, he ran back in the house to get his backpack. Confused, I told him he didn't need it. Equally confused, he returned it to the house. As we approached the kindergarten doors, Joshua said, "We need to line up here." He acted a little sluggish, nervous and skeptical when I told him we could just walk in.

At some point I must have finally got it through to him that it was just going to be, me, him and the teacher and it was not a glorified "Bring your mother to school day."

Joshua didn't ever quite get over looking nervous throughout the conference, despite the teacher's constant praise about him. She complimented his behavior, his efforts, his academics, his social skills and even went as far to say, "You have raised him very well."

I really quite enjoy parent/teacher conferences. For the most part, they have always gone very well for us as far as the good reports we hear from teachers. We've been to a lot over the years, but I do think my one yesterday afternoon with just me, Joshua and his teacher was one of my favorites. (Mike typically always goes too, but I'd made Joshua's appointment too early in the day for Mike to make it.)

A few of the reasons why I loved it:

The teacher showed me a piece of paper that had basic words and a check mark next to the ones that Joshua knew the beginning sound.

Words like, hat makes the "h" sound, "fall makes the "f" sound.

All the words were checked except for the word "run". When asked what sound/letter it started with, Joshua  had replied, "w". Which completely makes sense to Joshua's little "r"-sounds-like-"w"-type-world.

In Joshua's world if he is going to run to the neighbors, he "wuns". A chair is a "chay" a store is a "stoye" and when it is "dark" it is "dyke". And so really, the word "run" should have had a check mark by it, because in Joshua's head he was 100% correct.

I loved that Joshua got all of his rhyming words right, except "ball". Apparently that rhymes with "bob".

His numbers 1-5 were nicely written with everyone of them backwards. And though I may have panicked had he been a first child, I smiled instead.

On the other hand, his upper-case letters were all written correctly, and the lower-case ones were close.

I loved looking through his journal of simple sentences he had attempted to write over the last few weeks. Things like:

wt t gdmz and gpz hse

Which interpreted means, "Went to Grandma and Grandpa's house."

I loved all the pages, especially his ability to read all of them days and weeks later. I would have had no clue what they said if the teacher hadn't have written in below what they said.

I was enjoying each page, until the teacher turned the page and as soon as I saw it my face went red, and I was immediately horrified at what Joshua's spelling attempts looked like. Innocently the teacher 'read', "Went swimming." and I was:

a. Relieved that Joshua nor his teacher had as dirty of a mind as me, and
b. Beyond thankful that Mike hadn't been able to make the SEP after all. I'm pretty sure the two of us would have wound up in hysterical laughter, and left this young and single school teacher scarred for the rest of her career.

I can't bring myself to write the sentence here. But when I called Mike following the SEP to tell him about it, I was right--he laughed pretty hard too.

The SEP must have turned out better than Joshua had been expecting. As we drove home together, I heard a little voice from the back seat say, "That was 'weally fun."

Love that little Joshua of ours.

Drew's Off and Away

After much deliberation last spring, I opted to send Drew to preschool this fall. Last Wednesday was his first day. I've waited for this day for almost 14 years--the day when all of my children would be occupied at school for some amount of time....

As Drew walked into school on his first day, he ran 6 feet ahead of me. I couldn't for the life of me get him to slow down and walk by my side, let alone hold my hand. It caused all sorts of mixed feelings as I turned around and saw him not even look up at me as I did my best to get his attention as I waved goodbye. I kept my sunglasses on, despite being in the shade, to cover my eyes. Not because I was embarrassed for anyone else to see my tears, but because it felt like too private of a moment. I didn't want anyone intruding on such a personal occasion.

I felt as though I had climbed to the peak of a mountain. I felt as though I had arrived at some sought after destination, only to be reminded that really I'd only made it to a small plateau, and I still have several mountains to scale. But that's ok--I'm getting stronger at the climb every day.

As I turned and looked at Drew one last time, knowing I had stiff competition with the play-dough already being molded in his little hand, I waved one last time, blowing a kiss that went no further than the sliding glass door.

I returned to the car alone. Essentially, alone for the first time in almost 14 years.

Today I took my baby to preschool. It's a day that will be etched into my heart forever.

Here's to a GOOD School Year

Last Monday night I was pretty ornery. Actually, I was really ornery. I'll tell you a couple of the triggers...

After finishing up day 8 of Drew having diarrhea, I realized I absolutely had to make a trip to the store to purchase new underwear for him. After hearing (and dealing with) "I just popped (that's our term for passing gas) and now there is poop in my underwear" for the bazillioneth time last week, there were very few pair of underwear of Drew's left in the house. Yes, I'll admit, I'm a waster. Cleaning poop out of underwear is not something I do.

I can't believe I just wrote a whole paragraph about that.
Anyway-back to the fact I absolutely had to make a trip to the store to buy new underwear. In an attempt to avoid all the last minute back to school shoppers last Monday evening, I grabbed Drew a packet of assorted Disney underwear and came home. I usually have a rule about underwear needing to be washed before wearing, but Drew couldn't wait and on the new underwear went. As we all know, Drew wears only underwear and there was a slight problem.

The coverage wasn't great, and I'm not talking about my cell-phone that incidentally during this same hour, had to be taken into the cell-phone store THREE separate times.

Use your imagination if you'd prefer, but I'm not going to spell it out. All I'll say is the coverage wasn't great, and Mike and Luke were laughing their heads off every few minutes, and Drew, bless his heart kept having to make some adjustments to keep things tucked in.

Back to the store I went, to get the next size up.

By the time it was time for our annual Back to School Paper Doll Family Home Evening lesson, I was not very happy. The last thing I wanted to do was sit around as a family talking about the importance of being nice to others, when I clearly hadn't said a nice word to anyone for the last couple of hours.

Of course, tradition reigned. We've had the same Back to School Paper Doll lesson every year since the night before Megan started Kindergarten in 2004. Megan couldn't bear the thought of not having the lesson, and so out came the paper dolls, and the card stock for our one word reminder, and off Megan went with the evening.

After singing a few songs, and talking about our paper dolls without hair, or missing an arm, or wearing glasses, it was time to settle on a good word for the 2012-13 school year. Although Mike is still struggling with the fact the kids haven't mastered the word  we repeated for several years (OBEY), and we weren't exactly feeling the word from this last school year (LOVE), we still opted for a new word. The children offered some great suggestions, and with some guidance from Mike, came up with our new word.

We keep nothing on the front of the fridge but our one word reminder, each letter written by a child so they can "own" the word. We're thinking by next year we're going to have to move up to a 5 letter word, so Drew can participate in writing a letter too:

(And yes, in case you are thinking the "o" looks like an "a" it does. That was Joshua's letter, and Megan was not happy with his attempt. We had already had to start over a second time because the first "G" (by Ellie) didn't meet Megan's approval. Mike and I both snapped an overly loud "NO" at the same time, when Megan began suggesting starting over a third time. As you can see, we didn't exactly get off to a GOOD start!)

We're committed to making good choices, finding the good, getting good grades, being good friends, having good friends, being good examples, you get the idea.

Hopefully, the children will too.

And now, in all their sprinkler valve box glory tradition I present...

Joshua--kindergarten

 Ellie--3rd grade

Luke--5th grade

Megan--8th grade

Oh, and we couldn't exclude Drew.  More on him later...

Trendy or Not

I don't exactly get into trends of any kind. I'm the one that will refuse to read a book simply because everyone is reading it, or if I do, I read it years later. (Note: I have never seen or read a Harry Potter or Twilight movie or film.)

Up until two weeks ago, I had never taken trendy back to school photos either. Not that "trendy" is necessarily the right word, but you know what I mean, right? I mean, I'm the mom that takes my kids' first day of school pictures on our sprinkler valve box.

That all changed when Megan discovered Pinterest this summer. (Which I may add is one of those things I refuse to do because of the same reasons as Harry Potter or Twilight, etc.) For those of you that "follow" my name on Pinterest. It is 100% Megan. I've never clicked on the link in my life, although I have sat by her side as she navigates through it. (And I might add, it gives me mild anxiety to do that.)

I'm way off the subject.
Well kind of.
Megan decided it would be oh so fun to get creative and take "Cuter pictures than the valve box pictures you take every year."

Somehow, I got roped into doing it with her. It was actually kind of fun. Well, as fun as it can be trying to get kids to smile, and then act natural, then do this, then do that.

And Megan wasn't exactly happy when Joshua moved wrong.

Ellie kept getting in trouble for being too "posed."

Of course Drew didn't want to be left out. Megan was less than thrilled to be taking "posed" photos of Drew while wearing only underwear, but I insisted to avoid a tantrum.

Of course I insisted Megan participate. Except I didn't have as much patience as she did, so there are far fewer photos of her.

Luke wasn't home when the photo shoot occurred. But when he saw the photos being uploaded to the computer he looked horrified as he declared, "I am NOT doing that."

He didn't have to.
He'll get to stand on the green valve box instead. Along with everyone else on the morning of the first day of school.
It's tradition.
Stay posted.

Me! A Hero?

Last Friday I got around to filing away my children's school papers from this year. I keep very few of their papers throughout the year, and even still get rid of a few by the first week of summer when I go to file them in their individual boxes. I prefer to keep "personal" type papers; the "all about me" and journaling papers they write. I don't keep every report card and every art project they do.

I don't have everything I ever did in school, and I've never given it a second thought. I'm hoping my children will feel the same.

Back to Friday. As I was organizing the files, Megan brought down a small stack of papers from her bedroom she had brought home on the last day of school. She began going through them to see what to keep and what to discard. I was working on my own piles, when suddenly one of her paper's caught my eye. It was a short essay they had to write on "My Hero." And look who she wrote about?!?
Yours Truly.

It made my day. Especially, as we had had a morning that I'm quite certain would have not caused her to write such an essay about me just then. Of course it went into the "keeper" pile. And even re-reading it now, with all of its junior-highish grammar and handwriting, it makes me smile.

Reading this essay makes me realize that despite the drill-sergeant side of my personality that I feel comes out way too much, I must not be quite so bad after all.

A reminder I NEEDED by the end of the first week of summer.

A True Mother

There is a speech I frequently periodically give to my children when their behavior and/or attitude gets less than desirable. In short, I remind them of the fact that I gave them life. I remind them that the very fact they are alive and breathing is due to me (and Mike), and so if nothing else, that fact alone grants me respect.

They've each heard it over and over again, and every child of mine could probably give an impressive imitation version of the speech.

This week, I have added a line to my speech when should I ever have to give my speech again to Luke. It's a pretty simple line. In fact, one sentence is all.

"I drove goats to school for you."

Yes. You read that right.

This was me a few days ago.

I must give credit where credit is due. None of it would have been possible without my dear, kind neighbor who loaded the animals into the trailer and of course hooked the trailer to the suburban. All the while my dear husband worked a couple of counties away counting his blessings feeling badly he wasn't the one able to drive goats to school.

As I stood outside the school waiting for Luke and his class to come outside, I was mildly self conscious standing by a trailer with two loud goats inside, while my two pre-schoolers ran up and down the nearby stairs. Instead of ignoring the confused glance of a passer-by father, I simply smiled and declared, "I'm in the running for some Mother-of-the-year award." I'm not sure what his nervous laugh was a result of, the loud neah-ing sounds coming from the goats or my comment.

I'm really not a farm girl. If fact, what am I saying? I AM NOT a farm girl. As my dad likes to say, believe it or not I was once a proper little English school-girl. Yet somewhere along the way I took a drastic "wrong" turn and can now say I have driven goats to school for a 'show and tell'.

Although Hank and Lily stole the show, Luke was a pretty popular guy himself.

This better be a day Luke remembers for the rest of his life. The day his mother drove goats to school!! I don't ever pull trailers, let alone pulling a trailer carrying livestock.

What a mother!
Even if I do say so myself.