And another school year begins

Wednesday, September 7, 2011

It's my favorite day of the year: the first day of school! It was touch and go there for a couple days as our teachers decided to strike last Thursday. Fortunately they settled on a contract by Friday night and classes were only delayed one day. Since Ben is at a private school he started (much to his dismay) yesterday while his brothers got to prolong summer another 24 hours. I did make them go get haircuts so they couldn't have fun the ENTIRE day.

To show you what a stellar mother I am, I woke Ben up, got busy doing my thing and then realized it was 20 minutes until we had to leave. We rolled into the parking lot with a minute to spare only to find the entire overflow lot filled with cars. Oh yeah, the back to school assembly. Grrrr. With my "bedhead" and "morning breath" I opted to skip the gathering and let Dad walk him to the classroom. Nice. Fortunately, despite his mother's lack of planning, Ben had a great day. When he got home and I asked about his first day his response was: "AWESOME!! Ms. M is awesome!!"


My fun fourth grader


Ian was beside himself with excitement as he got to return to his middle school that burned down two years ago. No alarm was necessary this morning. The district finished the re-build a year ahead of schedule and it is so absolutely amazing. Makes me want to go back to middle school myself. I promised to be back from handing out schedules at the high school in time to take him and get his planner and ASB card. Well, we had a little mishap with cars and keys that I will share below. Anyway, we got there before the buses and he actually let me walk beside him to the building. I jokingly asked if he wanted to hold hands and he said: "it's bad enough that we're walking in together." Spoken like a true 13-year-old (in 8 days.)


My sweet seventh grader.

Ahhh....high school. It feels odd to be sending your child somewhere that you still remember like it was yesterday. Nonetheless, Quinn is embarking on his freshman year. I volunteered to help hand out schedules in the commons from 7-8. School began at 7:45 but Quinn opted to join me instead of having to walk an entire eighth of a mile. Since I had a coffee in each hand (one for me and one for my BFF) my son grabbed my keys and put them in his backpack. I knew this wasn't a wise choice but I immediately got distracted as my BFF walked up behind me to grab her coffee. We settled in to our table with another mom to pass out the "E-H" students. My BFF was going on about how much fun this is and she does it every year because she's nosey. The other mom didn't miss a beat and promptly replied, "I do it to pray over them." Ummmm, us too. I think we were put in our place. At 7:40 my panicked freshman came over and told me that someone stole his schedule out of his hand and he had no idea where his first class was. What a terrible feeling. The vice principal stepped in and sent him to the counseling office to pick up another copy. As I stood up to leave I realized where my car keys were--and where I probably shouldn't go if I still wanted a relationship with my son. Could you imagine me walking in to his first period class and announcing: "I'm Quinn's mom and he has my car keys!"?? I refrained and got a ride home from my BFF only to find my seventh grader at the door reminding me that we were supposed to be leaving....NOW!

And to think I have to get myself to school in two short weeks from today. I should have a little more practice by then.

Here's to a great school year for all our kiddos. May they all come home today with the enthusiasm of Ben!


My fabulous freshman

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