Preschool Week

Typical first day shots.


His classroom.


How he fell asleep after his first day alone.

Jack started preschool this week. He is going to the lady who taught my brother in preschool and my brother is almost 19! She has been doing it a long time and is really great with the kids. I have to admit, I was really sad about sending him. I just can't believe that he is so grown up already. These last three years have been so fast. On Tuesday, I took him to orientation. He was really excited about it on Monday, but when Tuesday arrived, he started getting nervous and saying that he didn't want to go to school yet. I told him that I would be there the whole time and it helped that he already knew his teacher from swimming lessons. We got there and after his initial shyness, he started playing right away with the kids. There are 16 kids in his class, mostly boys. His teacher does her preschool with her dad, Gramps to the kids, but the class seems big to me! I would never want to teach preschool! :)

During orientation, his teacher (we'll call her Mrs. L) laid out the plans for the month and then tentative plans for field trips etc throughout the rest of the year. After Mrs. L passed out the sheets and everything I started getting really excited for him. She is going to do a lot of fun things and Jack will learn so much. I am really excited to have something to organize for him, even though it is sad to start sending him out into the world. I left the orientation really excited and at peace with the whole thing.

Yesterday was his first day alone. We talked about him going to school and we got his backpack ready with his show and tell (Buzz and Woody). All morning, he was excited to go but kept saying, "You are staying with me? I will be scared if you leave..." I didn't want to lie to him, but also didn't want to give him false hope so I just said, "We'll see. I have to walk you down and we will see Mrs. L etc..." He seemed appeased, but still didn't quite trust how I was saying it. He's too smart for his own good. Anyway, we got there and we walked in, saw Gramps and continued downstairs. It was a good thing that Mrs. L told us at orientation that if the kids cry just leave and she will take care of it. If she hadn't said that, I would have had a harder time leaving. He walked into the room and starting heading to the toys... turned back and saw that I was still on the stairs. He freaked right out. Crying, running over to me... clinging to my neck for dear life. I kissed him a bunch of times and Mrs. L had to pry him away. I left feeling a little shaken and weird about having 2+ hours all to myself with nothing really to do. I went and saw my friends new baby and to the doc and to my moms... I knew Jack was probably having the time of his life, but it was still weird.

Finally, it was 210pm and it was time to head over to pick Jack up. I pulled into the street and all the kids were out front waiting for us. Jack ran up and happy as could be and jumped in the car telling me all about his first day. They made paper ice cream cones, showed their show and tell and got to know eachother. He seemed to have a great day and now we are both really excited for this year! It will be so great for him.

When we got home, I was going to try to keep him awake until bedtime by making cookies, trying to get him out for a walk etc, but he managed to sneak in a 30 min nap. He was beat! I am going to have to tweak his nap schedule a little bit over the next few weeks.