our newest stage of life..kindergarten

So…kindergarten! Wow. It has been crazy, but probably in the way that it should be. We’ve been inducted into that new elite group of back to school shoppers. Which wasn’t really too exciting….kindergarteners don’t need that much! Just a lunch box and back pack. Thankfully Katelyn let me get her a cute pink star jansport bag (on sale!!!) as opposed to a plastic princess backpack that might not make it past this grade! I did give her free reign over lunch boxes though….thus Tinkerbelle.
We had kindergarten orientation for about 30 minutes the day before school started. Katelyn got to meet her teacher, color a picture and I got all the information that I could ever want. It was good.
The morning of kindergarten, we were prepared. We had our new routine practiced and in place. Thankfully everything went smoothly….first day of school pictures, no spilled milk to cry over. I drove Katelyn to school. I was under the impression that a lot of parent would be driving their kids. But I was one of few. When we got to the school zone…you know, where the yellow lights flash for you to go slow…I started to say something like “here we go” to Katelyn and that is when I started to get choked up. But I totally got control of myself. She got in line with the other kids and I started to tear up again when a parent asked how I was holding up…once Katelyn was in line, I was pretty much ok, in that I knew that crying in front of her was not a possibility.
……so I waited. I waited until after she got in her class line and DIDN’T look back at me.
…..and I waited until she was out of sight walking into the school.
….and I waited until…..just kidding, once she was out of sight I was sobbing like a baby. It was rather pathetic, but it really did feel better. I managed to sob the whole twenty minutes home, plus at least fifteen more inside the house and while hanging laundry. I was basically stopped crying while I was hanging laundry until I turned to look at the porch to make sure Katelyn was in sight while I was working outside….well DUH, she wasn’t……..because my baby grew up and went to school!
The good and the bad news is that I was crying for myself….i felt really alone now, I would be more lonely, more time on my hands, way less quality time with my little girl, etc…. the good part is that I wasn’t crying for her. Thankfully she didn’t cry, and I knew that she would be fine and that this is a normal part of life.
Since school has started, she’s done well. She rides the bus to school, and seems excited when I pick her up after wards. She has tons of little friends and seems to enjoy school. All the papers that come home seem to be right on track. Honestly she’s even done better than I expected.
So that is our kindergarten journey so far. And I will try to keep posting more regularly, a new computer might be in our future……..