Kindergarten Chaos

I am glad I waited till today to post about Sophie's first week of Kindergarten. If you had asked me how it went Monday, I would have said "Great!". She wasn't thrilled to get up at 6:05am, but then again, neither was I. She was very excited about the bus, but didn't want me bringing my camera to the bus stop. So, here are the photos in front of the house, with the necessary signage.



It felt wierd walking back into the house at 7:05, Sophie gone until 2:45, and the twins still asleep. What to do? How about enjoy breakfast and read the paper for a few minutes? Very nice. The girls arrived about 8:30. I had invited them over for muffins and coffee, so we could swap stories of how our kids did that morning, and celebrate this milestone. Holly showed up with a bottle of champagne, so we had mimosas to boot.

Not so sad moms Kathleen and Holly.

Looking less and less sad: Me and Paula

Looking downright ecstatic: Rebekah and Paula

The rest of the day was uneventful. Michael and Emily had a great time playing with the 3 and 4 year olds that morning, and took a good nap. I did some laundry, bills, stuff like that, all the while keeping an eye on the clock. At 2:30 I walked up to the bus stop and there was Sophie, happily getting off the bus.
Here she is with (from left) Lily and Bella, who have also started Kindergarten this year. Lily is Sophie's assigned seat mate on the bus, and both of them live up the street from us. Sophie has already asked when she can have them over to play. Their moms are nice, I think this could be the start of a beautiful friendship. I made "indoor smores" for after school snack, it was a hit.

So all went fine until I was tucking her in. Then the floodgates opened, and she sobbed for 30 minutes. I was taken aback to say the least. I knew she was tired, but she let loose with "Please don't make me go back, I don't like it, it's boring (new favorite all purpose word), I just want to go back to Mt. Zion and see my friends!" When I reminded her that her friends were all in Kindergarten too she responded, "No, Mommy, that is not what I want you to tell me!" I did manage to calm her down and she told me that 3 girls in her class were reading together, and went she approached them to ask if she could read too, they covered up the book so she couldn't see it, and turned away from her. I knew she wasn't making this up b/c I had observed this happening last week at Meet and Greet. At the time I thought that they must be friends from outside school, but still thought it pretty crappy for them to exclude another child like that. I know your child can't be friends with everyone, but Kindergarten cliques, come on! I finally got her to focus on some of the more postive aspects of her day, the ones she had been telling me about up until bedtime, and that seemed to make her feel better.

I also sent her teacher an email, asking if she had been ok during the day, and letting her know what had happened at bedtime. Sophie has lucked out with a great teacher, she not only emailed me right back, at 10:30pm, but called me the next morning when I got back from the bus stop to make sure I had received her email. Sophie had a great first day, she told me, she was fine at school. She assured me that falling apart at home was quite normal, and that it really took until December for the children to adjust to being so busy for a full day. She also thanked me for letting her know about the "mean girls" and said she would nip that in the bud. Sophie came home on Tuesday and happily told me that they had let her play with them. That night at bedtime, she only sobbed for about 10 minutes. Each day has gotten better and I have not heard the "don't make me go back" mantra since Tuesday night. But boy, she is TIRED. Tonight at 5:45 she told me she wanted to take a nap. No nap, just in the tub at 6pm, and asleep at 6:30. With no complaints, that is how I know she is really tired.

And Michael and Emily? They are fighting a stomach bug. Yesterday after nap Emily woke up lethargic and burning up. Her temp was 102 and after 10 minutes of laying on me in the rocking chair, she threw up all over both of us. No Meet and Greet for her this morning at Mt Zion. And my blogging was just interrupted for about 30 minutes. Michael woke up with the cry that let's you know something is wrong, he is now burning up, and after sitting with him for about 10 minutes, he threw up all over both of us as well. So, a quick bath for him, and he fell sound asleep while I was getting his clean pj's on. Don't think the three of us will be going to my Media Center (why can't they just call it the library?) orientation tomorrow at Soph's school, which is just as well. We could use a quiet day at home, this Kindergarten stuff is exhausting!