Ian's 1st day of school!

Yesterday my oldest baby, Ian, had his very first day of school! I had been preparing him for several weeks, letting him know that soon he'd be starting school and he'd be going there almost every day. He didn't seem the tiniest bit phased by it. We took Sean and Emmett to the farm and I took pictures of him there (see below). Then I let him pick out where he wanted to eat for lunch (he chose Perkins), and we headed to school. He's in the afternoon class which starts at 12:15.

As soon as we got out of the car, I could tell he was nervous. As we entered the building, he started squeezing my hand tighter. Finally, as I sat down at one of the tiny tables to fill out a few papers, he was full on freaking out. He was grabbing me so tightly and begging me not to leave. He even wrote "MOM" on the top of one of the papers to try to convince me to stay.

Luckily, there were a few familiar faces there. This 4k is at the same center that his previous daycare is located, and the teacher from him 3 year old room is now the 4k assistant. I was so relieved to see her there as I know how much she adores Ian. She actually had to be the one to pry him off of me so I could leave. At least he wasn't the only one upset, almost the entire class was crying!

The next hours dragged on as I worked at home and wondered what he was doing. Did he stop crying? Did he feel like I abandoned him? Was he making friends? Learning? Having fun? I was pulling into the parking lot at 2:59, not a moment too soon. I peek in on him before letting him see me, and he was running around outside and looking like he was having a blast. PHEW! He teacher said he was a great listener and answered questions about the story at story time. She said he calmed down almost right away and had a great day.

As we drove home, I asked him how he day was. He said he had fun and played with other kids. They read a story but didn't do any crafts. He also said, "Mommy, I didn't learn things today." I asked him, "What did you want to learn that you didn't learn yet?" He said, "Santa's phone number." Oy.

All in all, it was a good day. It's so hard for me to believe that this was literally the first day of the next 18+ years. We now have a school-aged child and this will be our new normal till Emmett is 18 years old! After that, they're on their own ;-)

And now, my favorite part! The pictures!