first day of first grade

 My first grader.

FIRST grader!

 6:40 a.m. - The morning starts out a little rough... since she's been wearing flip-flops and dressy sandals most of the summer, mommy didn't realize that NONE of her bazillion sensible, cute playground shoes fit her!  NONE. Especially not the ones I had laid out for her.  We try on shoe after shoe after shoe.  Who knew her feet grew a whole size in less than 2 months?!  We finally find a pair, although a little big, that will work as long as she wears thick socks with them.

7:10 - Breakfast.

7:18 - Wake Tate up (who was not so happy to be woken up at such an early hour).

7:23 - Check backpack for essentials and insert lunch.

7:25 - Rush out the door for some pictures. But not too many because now we're running behind thanks to the shoe fiasco.

7:27 - Begin our beautiful walk to school.

7:30 - Get partway down the street, and poor little Adeline gets a little too close to the stroller and trips over the wheel, falling and skinning her knee.  We all rush back to the house where I run and get a bandaid.  She's fine.  Still excited for school.  I start questioning the time and if we should drive instead.  But it's too beautiful outside, so we proceed to walk again.

7:44 - We finally make it to school.

 This is the hardest part for me.  

The locker.  

Last year they hung their stuff up in closets in the kindergarten room.

So safe and cozy.

This year her locker is way out in the hall.

Not so safe and cozy.

Way too independent.

When we walk into the room, I think we're late.  Nearly all the kids but one or two are all sitting quietly in their seats and there are no other parents to be seen.

I check the clock.

7:46.

"Doesn't school start at 7:55?" I ask, afraid that they had changed the starting time and not informed me.

"Yes," replies the super sweet (I mean, really really incredibly sweet - LOVE her!) teacher.

Phew.

So I have a another minute to take one more picture.

A real desk this year instead of tables!

*sigh*

And we leave.

Mommy's heart sinks.

And keeps sinking.

I'm not quite sure why, but this year feels even harder for me than last year.  Maybe it's because I wasn't as prepared.  With Kindergarten, there's more info sent to you ahead of time, more parent prep nights at school, more communication with the teacher.  With first grade, they expect you to know everything, which I guess I should.  There's just not as much warning and then *BAM* all of a sudden, it's the middle of August (which is so absurd) and my little girl's gone all day.  :(

I think the only thing that will help this sinking heart today is seeing that sweet little smile... in about an hour now!  And hearing all about her wonderful day.  I'm praying it was wonderful.  I'm sure it was.  She makes friends very easily and loves to learn (both traits that we are very thankful for!).

But in the meantime, this little sweetie was also very excited for today.

We started preschool at home today!  We spent an hour (during nap time) going over some brand new workbooks and learning lots of new things.  It was great having some quality one-on-one time with her.

49 minutes 'til we pick up Addie!