School Prep

Aug 21

Safirekindergarten kindergarten 3 Comments

Everyone,

Last night I went out with my mom’s group for dinner.  We all have girls that are born within a few months of each other.  And these girls are all our first kids.  I love these ladies.  We’ve been together since the kids were less than 3 months old.  It’s amazing to have these connections with these ladies, and their daughters!

Anyway, the topic du jour last night was, of course, kindergarten.  What schools are expecting from us, what we are expecting from the school, what problems we might encounter, what problems we have already encountered (school supply lists) and how we think the girls are going to handle it.

The best part about last night was the fact that I got to talk to some first time kindergarten parents that are also freaking out a little.  Oh we’re all not worried for the girls.  They will do just fine.  They will thrive.  They are all bright happy girls.  It’s us that we’re worried about!  So here’s some of my worries for school.  (Notice most of them are about me.)

• The drop off/pick up situation.  I will not be sending Butterfly on the bus, even though we are far enough away to have a bus route.  It’s a very long bus ride (over half an hour) and we know NO ONE on the bus.  I don’t mind dropping her off and picking her up.  But the school wants me to walk her to the door.  Every day.  That means I have to buckle and unbuckle everyone to get her up to the door.  PLUS, the boys typically sleep from 1-4pm for their naps.  Daily.  School ends at 3:30pm.  So I either need to move their nap an hour, or shorten it an hour.  Of course, if I move it an hour, I have to be home to feed the boys around 11:30am to give them lunch and get them down by noon.  That shortens my day considerably.  Ouch.
• Lunch.  I am slightly nervous for Butterfly for this one.  I’m sure it will be old hat to us after a month or so, but right at the beginning I’m nervous.  Just this week she got her lunch box in the mail, and some reusable sandwich wraps/cotton bags.  I’ve been trying her out with the things I’m sending her, like apple sauce and yogurt, to make sure she can open all of these things by themselves.  She’ll do fine, right?!
• Bathroom.  Now Butterfly is still a dress girl so I’m not worried about buttons or belts she has to deal with.  It’s the fact that she gets SO busy that she will not stop to go to the bathroom.  Then she dances.  And when she finally admits she has to go, it’s an emergency!  And sometimes she doesn’t make it.  I’d like to send her an extra set of clothes in a gallon zip lock bag but would that be too baby-ish or uncool?  The school doesn’t have a policy on it one way or another.

Anyway, those are some of my concerns.  She has EVERYTHING I could possibly imagine she would need.  She knows which one is the girls room, to raise her hand if she wants to say something, and to love school.  I think she’s ready.

I hope I am.

Safire