*happy dance*
Many moms dread sending their little ones off to school; they get teary eyed. Not me. I was counting down the days. And I didn't get misty eyed at all. The only tears were from Morgan...because she didn't want to LEAVE preschool. That's why I was so excited to send her. The kid is a social butterfly. She needs people. She gets tired of my face all day every day. She gets tired of being in our house with a newborn with our big trip to Walmart or Kroger once a week and random trips to the doctor. It takes the pressure off me to entertain her and get her out of the house. It makes me feel like a better mommy for letting her have this social and educational experience.
Last spring we did a little research on local preschools and visited several and then made our final decision to send her to a preschool that is very flexible and not so structured. She's only 3 years old after all. There's a school only about a mile from our home that has morning session, afternoon session, or all day session. We are NOT morning people so we opted for the 12-2 session, and it's only 4 days a week, so it gives her a couple of hours of 'out of the house social experience without mommy and away from baby' time each day.
Morgan was so excited to go to school. Almost every day during the summer she asked 'can I go to school now?' honesty, it's the only thing that got her potty trained last spring when we threatened she couldn't go to school until she was out of diapers. I kept telling her 'soon' because she's like a dog, she has no concept of time.
The big day finally arrived. I had a special shirt made for her with a matching bow (see photo below) and we had her backpack packed with...air...because honestly what does a 3 year old need to take to school.
The only catch was the first day was orientation, and it started at 9:30. I know some of you are like 'wahhhhhh my day starts at 5am!' and I'm glad I can't see you sending me stink eye via internet. Morgan stays up late and therefore sleeps late. Horrible habit to start with a kid but it's part of my mommy survival, it works for me, I'm okay with it. I also don't feed her everything organic if you want to judge me for that too.
I set my alarm for 8. I have a 2 month old that eats every 3 hours and I'm exhausted, so I didn't trust myself to be up in time. Jack was up at 7 that morning and we both fell back asleep during the feeding (me holding the bottle and Jack slobbering out the side of his mouth) so it's a good thing I set the alarm. I had an hour and a half to get myself and 2 little kids ready....to drive a mile. First I had to get Morgan up. I turned on her light and she opened one eye and demanded 'what are you doing?' and when I said 'you get to go to school today!' she smiled, but when I left to go do something and then returned to her room she had rolled over and buried her face in her pillow....seriously kid?! So I dragged her out of bed and rolled her into some clothes. Then I got myself dressed. Then I got Jack dressed. Then I tried to get Jack's diaper bag packed since parents were supposed to stay during orientation and I knew my fat boy would be ravenous 3 hours after his last feeding. We have been adding a little oatmeal cereal to his bottles and while trying to open the container we store it in, I dropped it...and baby oatmeal went EVERYWHERE. That stuff is like little tiny flakes of fluff. It was on the counter. The floor. The rug. My foot. A cat. I said a few choice words and then dragged the vacuum in. While using the hose to suck up the mess, the air blowing out of the top of the vacuum blew the oatmeal around making it snow baby cereal in my kitchen. The cats ran through to inspect the commotion and ended up wearing a thin layer of oatmeal making look like they had severe dandruff, and then left a train of cereal as they ran out of the kitchen. In the process of dragging the vacuum around (which was plugged into the wall above the counter) the chord knocked over my beloved morning can of Red Bull spilling it across the counter onto the floor. *SCREAM*
So I had another mess to clean up. I thought about licking it up until I saw there were a few sprinkles of oatmeal and cat hair floating in the pool of Red Bull. I wiped up the last bit of sticky mess from the floor and can hear Jack filling his diaper in the living room. The boy farts like a fat old man and holds on for dear life whatever his little fists can get ahold of while he grunts out a diaper full. While I'm changing him he spits up all over his outfit. So I have to find him a clean outfit. By then it was 9:20 and we needed to be there at 9:30. I herded Morgan down the stairs and strapped Jack into his carried only to find the vehicle was LOCKED. We park in the garage and never lock our cars. I ran back upstairs to check all of Michael's 'dumping spots' for the keys but ended up having to call him at work to ask him where the keys were. He told me they were int he front seat of the car. We always leave our windows down to air the cars out while they are in the garage, but they were just half down this time and the lock button in Land Rovers are in the middle of the car above the CD player, and I couldn't reach the keys in the seat so Michael tells me via phone 'just reach in and open the door'....which I do....and the alarm goes off....so I yell to Michael 'I GOTTA GO!!' while both of my kids scream and cry at the noise which is amplified in the garage until I finally get the key into the ignition and the alarm stops.
By then I've got sweat rolling down my back and my eye is twitching, but I get the kids into the car and we drove all the way to school...a whole mile away...just in time. And Morgan left me standing at the door and didn't look back.
The look of 'fear' on Morgan's face is because I threatened her life if she didn't stop messing up the writing on the white board. I seriously had to fix it 5 times. But unfortunately the result was Morgan's first day of preschool pictures turning out looking like she was scared to death. Sigh.
