Transition

Before I start babbling, here are some pictures from the Gingerbread Man Hunt that Andrew's class did this past week. First they baked him and then he ran away!! The Gingerbread Man left clues and ultimately, Andrew's teacher caught him by the leg so they got to eat it. :-)

A clue! The Gingerbread Man left a clue in Andrew's cubby.

Look High!!

Look low!!!

Look REALLY close!

It's the Gingerbread Man!!!

So, this morning, I woke up late (shocker!) and had to rush to get to Andrew’s daycare. I had a meeting scheduled to meet with his new teachers since he’s transitioning this week. Transitioning to where, you ask? PRE-K!!! Oh my goodness, I know that’s not Kindergarten or anything, but it’s close enough and I’m ready to stop the clock.

I honestly thought I was a-ok and prepared to talk about my baby boy having lunch cafeteria style (so he’s prepared for Kingergarten), working on writing letters, math, only an hour nap (really meant to be “quiet time”), saying the Pledge of Allegiance, etc… Once I sat down and realized that he was entering big boy territory, I was so sad and yet excited for him at the same time.

Andrew is a sponge and although he’ll be on the lower end of the totem pole (the Pre-K bday cut off is 9/1 and Andrew’s bday is 8/22) I know he’s going to just soak it all in. As long as he’s being challenged, he’ll be engaged. Of course, on the flip side, if he’s not challenged, he’s going to be spending some quality time in the carpet area by himself.

After this year, we enter the true “private or public school” debate. We are fairly certain Andrew will start in public school and then depending on how challenged he is depends on whether he switches to public. I will never forget Alex’s elementary school years. In 4th grade he was in trouble every single day. We finally figured out that he was bored. Keith and Sabrina met with the teacher because Alex had been trying to throw pencils and get them stuck in the ceiling. When asked why, we got the typical 4th grade response of “I don’t know”. Turns out, he was done with his work very early and had taken out a book to read. He got in trouble for reading so decided to occupy his time with pencil throwing.

I’m not sure where I was going with that, but Andrew is a lot like Alex. If he’s bored, he’ll find something to do and it will most likely not be what the teacher wants him to do. I was raised in public school and both of my parents were public school teachers so I’m not opposed to public school at all. That being said, we want our son to get the best education and we’ll figure out where that is at some point.

So, this week the transition occurs. My little boy who relies on sleep like his mommy, will now have an hour of quiet time vs. two and half hours of full on sleep. He will need to be to school at 8:00 so we’ll be on a pretty strict schedule (I think I’m going to have a harder time adjusting to the morning schedule then he will). Bed time will move up a bit provided I can make that work with bath time and bedtime.

The next year is going to be full of transitions. The biggest boy is starting his senior year! One year from now, he’ll be heading off to college. Seriously? That’s only 52 Sunday Dinners left. One year from now, our littlest boy will be starting elementary school. One year from now, I will be a mess. Yep – planning my breakdown already.

Little does Keith know, we’re going to need to start adding more children to this house! I’m not ready to let go of having an itty bitty one yet – it’s bad enough to have one super independent child in the house (Alex). Soon, I’ll have two. Keith will have no clue what’s going on when I put a stack of papers in front of him to sign for our next dossier. And I’ll just tell him the social worker is visiting for a post-placement, not for a home study update. And to explain our next trip to Russia? Well, vacation, of course!

And I'll leave you with a funny conversation (depending on how you look at it, of course).

Last Friday while I was rushing around trying to get ready….

Me: Andrew, where did you put my brown belt that you were playing with?
Andrew: In the garbage. You’re getting way too big and so it won’t fit you anymore.

So, I head into my bedroom, already frustrated because I’m trying to find jeans to fit into, squeeze into something and head to work.

Fast forward to this morning and I have to go weigh in for our weight loss challenge.

Yep, gained 5 pounds since vacation. I think Andrew is psychic or something.

Off to find a salad for lunch!
Becky