une autre mère: back to school, tumbling and a little parade

Okay, so I'm a little late on this post... Back to school for us this year started almost a month ago! August 15 was the dreaded day back.

Well, dreaded for mama and Millie, but highly anticipated for 2nd grader extraordinaire, Miss Adeline!

Millie started Kindergarten this year, which was a huge step since we did preschool at home, and also since she didn't turn 5 until August 26, making her the youngest in her class. And our district doesn't offer half-days or every-other-day kindergarten. It's full time, all day, 5 days a week. Ug. :(

We debated waiting another year to send her, but then decided that her anxiety of leaving mama and being in large groups of people wasn't likely to change in a year's time.

And now, halfway into week #4, we're glad we decided to send her. She's nervous in the mornings before she goes to school, and sheds a few tears now and then at drop-off, but once she's there she's totally fine. In fact, she tells me every afternoon how much fun she had. And her teacher says she's doing great and doesn't seem anxious in class at all!

And when I saw one of her new kindergarten friends (who was kept back a year - she turned 6 end of August) crying and clinging to her mama when she dropped her off the other day, I realized that even if we would've waited another year, the problem of leaving mama wouldn't change. I don't think that'll ever really be resolved. The girl just loves her mama, and who can blame her? ;) Ha.

But since this Kindergarten experience started out so much harder than Addie's, we've decided not to risk it with Tate and register him for 4-year-old preschool next year. Addie never went to preschool either, but she's always been little Miss Independent. Millie and Tate, on the other hand, are clingers. I think sending Millie to preschool last year would've made a huge difference. Not really academically (in fact, I think she learned more at home!), but socially and for separation issues.

Possibly the worst part of back-to-school this year was that for the first three days, we weren't allowed to bring them to their classrooms, but instead drop them off in the gym for a "rally" before school. This was new to me.

So, I had to leave my nervous little baby girl in a huge, cold gym full of loud kids she didn't know. I couldn't even take her to her locker and help her with her backpack. :(

That was definitely a bad idea (and hopefully not to be continued next year!). I guess after I left her, she started crying because it was just so loud and chaotic and so foreign to her.

(See the back of her sweet little head? In front of the boy in the green shirt.)

Thankfully, the next week, we were allowed to walk them to their classrooms, which went much smoother! And now, big sis Addie walks Millie to her class every day.

I'm so glad she has Adeline there. In fact, last Friday they both came bounding out of the school doors together so excited to tell me that their classrooms are "buddy classes" this year! They had an activity on Friday where Addie and Millie actually got to "buddy-up" and play bingo together! And it sounds like they'll get to do more together this year too. Thank you, God, for the little things! :)

Now on to tumbling...

Millie has always been a good little tumbler, so we enrolled her into the city's parks and rec 6 week tumbling class.

She was a little nervous at first to get out there in front of all the parents watching, but once she did it, she couldn't stop smiling!

And she couldn't stop somersaulting.

Tumbling ended just before birthday season got underway. So we'll end this blogpost with these pics of this adorable little "parade" that Addie and the neighbor kids (Sidney and Jonathan) made for Millie's and Tate's birthdays.

Here's the float: