Kindergarten, yo! I was a little leery at first-- like I was giving my first born away to SOCIETY, maaaan, and I'd never really get him back again. But now I find myself doing a happy dance every morning, Monday through Friday. Take this boy and give him structure! Suck the energy from him and return him to me in a pretty, placid little package! (OK, I shit you not, I just looked up 'placid' in the dictionary because it so reminds me of the word 'flaccid' that I just wanted to make sure I was using it right-- and the example sentence was "an exceptionally placid mother who was rarely upset by her six children". Oh yeah? F#*k you!)
Anyway... a pretty, placid little package is so NOT what I receive at the end of the school day! It's an adjustment period, I know, but he is tired. And cranky. Today, I think I finally narrowed it down to hunger. He was borderline psychotic until I fed him a huge lunch, so I guess I'll start trying to make him eat more in the morning so we can avoid the After School Meltdown. (And avoid him ever saying "whatever" to me again like he did yesterday. Six days into school and he's as snotty as a preteen girl!)
It is fun, though, watching him put his little backpack together in the morning-- or 'packpack', as he calls it-- and get excited for the bus ride. He's really loving the independence of it all. He was too nervous to take the bus the first morning of school, so I drove him and walked him into class. All the kids settled right into their seats and started their morning coloring projects, while a few of us parents sorta hovered around, positive that any second we would be needed for an extra hug or another goodbye. The teacher finally said, "See, parents? See how independent your Kindergarteners are? Let's say our goodbyes!" When we realized we were being those parents, we sheepishly migrated out of the room. One of the dads was crying, and I felt a little tight-throated... until I got to the car, and I was like "Woo-hoo! Let's go to Target!!"
One last game of "Squish the Baby's Soft Spot" before school:
Posing:
Exhibit A-- Cars 2 'PackPack':
Colton agreed to take the bus home from school. It wasn't as intimidating to him since the ride home would only be with other Kindergarteners, and the teachers lead them from the outside classroom door directly onto the bus. Casey, Mackenzie and I decided to walk the 1/4 mile to the bus stop to meet him since it was a nice day.
Little did we know, we'd been followed:
Abigail Brush! That beast of a dog must have stayed a good 30 yards behind us, because every time I turned around to check for cars, the road was empty. I can just picture her, diving behind bushes and snickering like a cartoon dog.
This patch of grass is definitely tall enough to hide me. What? No. Look away. You didn't see anything here.
It would have been okay if she was like, uhhhh... a good dog? But no, she is Satan's Spawn. She ran across the main road a few times to bark at the dogs sitting pleasantly behind a fence, in their own yard, then thought "Hey! While I'm out here, maybe I'll chase a couple of trucks. OOH! A jogger!" I probably looked like a whackjob out there running after her, yelling apologies at passing cars and obscenities at her. Finally, when the bus was about 15 minutes later than they said it was going to be and I got paranoid about Colton getting off at the wrong stop (not to mention so aggravated at Abby that I was starting to think it wouldn't be so bad if she would run back into the road one last time, just to, you know... see what happens), I decided to call Shawn. The same Shawn who had worked night and day and day and night for days and days and had just gone to bed about three hours prior. That one. He got up out of bed, got dressed, drove to the bus stop-- and arrived at the same time Colton hopped off the bus.
A Happy Ending.
