Eastie's First Day of School

So far so good.

I had to set my alarm this morning to shower and start breakfast (chocolate chip muffins) before going in to wake up my preschooler. At 7:10 I went in to rouse him. He was in great spirits the entire morning. Whew! I put him in front of the second half of Handy Manny with his juice while I finished getting ready and then brought him his clothes. Daddy helped him get dressed and sent him downstairs for breakfast with me:


What's that green thing, you ask? His full body "bib". I put him in an old shirt to protect his school clothes from the melted chocolate in his muffins, a clothespin keeping it from gaping too much:


It ended up being just E and me for breakfast. We sang songs to the tune of "Just the Two Bills" from Little Bill. It was fun.

He's not used to eating quite that early at all so he didn't eat too much muffin and didn't even finish his juice (which is unheard of). So, with a little more time left I sent him upstairs to brush his teeth and make his bed.

We're awful and we really only brush their teeth at bedtime. But I know we SHOULD do it in the mornings too. Perfect time to start. I came upstairs to find him brushing away like a good boy:




And then in to make his bed:




He was in such a good mood all morning. It was wonderful. He seemed so excited about school.

We said goodbye to Daddy and we were off!


Here he is walking in for his first day:


We hung up his backpack outside the classroom and we signed in. His teacher remembered his name no problem. She directed us to his name tag where all the children were already starting to color their name tags:


Nobody was being particularly social yet, not kids or parents. Oh well. We moved over to the big globe rug to start some circle time:


A cute little boy sat next to us so I told Easton to say, "Hi what's your name?" and he did. And the little boy was very shy but we met him and his mom.

Mrs. M went over some things like, "please sit criss-cross-applesauce" and "when you hear me turn on this music box, it means its time to come sit at this rug". We sang a good morning song, ABCs, Twinkle Twinkle, and Itsy Bitsy Spider. She took attendance and each kid was to say, "I am here". Alphabetically Easton S is somehow last so by the time it got to him he knew the routine and did great! I wasn't sure, sometimes he can be a total wonk but he did just as he was supposed to. Yay!

We went over all the days of the week and months of the year before the kids watched her place today's tile on the calendar and then we all recited, "Today is Tuesday, August 26th, 2008". Whatever. If I ever have to write a check I'll know who to ask what day it is. :)

Then Mrs. M got out a big rope for the kids to hold onto while she took us on a short tour out to the playground. I guess for this age that's what they need to know how to stay in a line when walking through the halls. She took us through the library, past the other classrooms (where we saw our neighbor Ben in his class!) and then out to the playground. She gave the kids a few rules like: sand and sand toys stay in the sandbox and the monkey bars by the slide are for kids 4 and older. Easton is already talking about how after his Batman birthday party he can go on those monkey bars. But there is plenty of other stuff for him to do:



We made sure to introduce him to other kids as they sat by him on the swings.

Mrs. M had a bell she warned them she'd ring when it was time to line up to go inside. When we heard the bell, Easton was the first to line up:


He did great and then it was snacktime! Half a graham cracker and some apple juice (which E is really not a fan of):


The teachers showed them how to clean up their spots, complete with wiping it down with a sponge. Impressive!

Then the kids all moved back to the globe rug for a felt board story that had Easton giggling and shouting out along with the story:


After the story Mrs. M mentioned how next time the parents wouldn't be coming during class. Easton glanced over at me nervously so there is no telling how he'll do on Thursday.

He shook both teachers' hands on the way out and we actually got the paperwork for their first fundraiser of the year. What the heck? And then we came home. Dalton was still sleeping! We told Daddy about the morning and then sent him off to work. At around 9:30 I went to wake D and he was out cold. It was nice though because he was so snuggable and soft. Like he was a baby again. After his breakfast we headed out to Wal-Mart and then back home for some lunch.

Gramoo called to find out how today went and Easton was excited to talk to her to tell her himself:


Now it's quiet time for both boys as Dalton currently has no interest in sleeping. He's not tired after waking up so late! I'm working on it, though.

So...as I said: so far so good. We'll see how Thursday goes!