First day of (Jumpstart) kindergarten

The last almost 6 years have been leading up to today and it was just as emotional as I thought it was going to be.

Friday, the boys and I went shopping with Namma and Gamma for Braedon's school clothes. We went to Penny's and had WAY too much fun and spent WAY more than I had planned on. Chris and I had different views about the whole new school clothes thing for Kindergarten. I always looked forward to buying new clothes and I remember how good I felt going to school in new clothes. Chris thought Kindergarten was too early and we should wait until he starts first grade...needless to say, I won that battle. As I said earlier, we had way too much fun but Penny's was having a really good sale in the boys department. He got about 10 pairs of shorts, probably 15 or so shirts, shoes, socks, undies, Transformers backpack and Bumble Bee lunch box. After 2 hours of shopping and trying on-a lot for a boy of any age :-) -we headed to Peter Piper Pizza for lunch and some running around time for Braedon. When we got home, I got busy cutting off all the tags so they could get washed. I cleared out the clothes that were too small and replaced them with all his new big boy clothes. I also seperated school clothes from play clothes. I hated this as a kid but it isn't until you are a parent that you understand and appreciate what your parents did.

Yesterday morning, we got a newspaper to look at all the ads and headed to Wal-Mart for some basic school supplies. The secretary at the school said he would get a supply list on his first official day of school but we would be safe picking up the basics before school started. We picked up some Transformers portfolios to hold all his papers and homework, glue, stick glue, crayons, pencils, coloring pencils, erasers, pencil sharpener, ruler, markers and a Bumble Bee spiral notebook. I don't know how much the notebook will get used since he's still learning how to write but he wanted it. Last night, we loaded up his backpack, picked out his "first day" clothes and headed off to bed early for a goodnight's rest.

This morning I woke up in a panic. I had nightmares, which I thought were only reserved for kids. Apparently there's a whole new set of nightmares when you are the parent of school age children. I dreamt (is that a word?) that we were late, he didn't make any friends-yeah right if you know Braedon LOL, kids made fun of him, he sat alone at lunch, and last but certainly not least; he couldn't find me when school was out and vice versa. There were a lot of kids just running around looking for their parents and he was stuck in the middle of it and I couldn't find him. Man! Dreams are crazy and I woke up sweating and shaking thinking I had missed the alarm..but it was only 6 and he didn't have to be there until 8:30. I just stayed up to make sure I didn't miss the alarm. I took my time getting ready, packing his lunch, making sure his clothes weren't wrinkled and made him breakfast then woke him up.

I was doing OK until we got to the school. We took pictures in front of the house and I was fine. It wasn't until I took a picture at the school in front of the gym that I just about lost it. I held it in and stayed strong though I had 3 more urges before we even got to his classroom. Once we got in the classroom, I signed him in and let them know I would be picking him up while he put his backpack away and sat at a table with some kids putting puzzles together. I bent down to give him a hug and kiss; say goodbye and tell him to have a GREAT day. I was hesitant to leave and felt like I needed to stay and watch but there weren't any other parents in there and I could feel the teacher looking at me telling me with her eyes that he would be ok and I needed to leave. I turned around to walk out the door and just as I was opening the door, Braedon turns around and yells "Mommy!"---"Yes bud?"---"I'll miss you!"---"I'm going to miss you too bud"---insert tears here---I held it in until I was out the door where I met several other mothers letting their tears out too. I didn't feel so bad :-)

It was a long 3 hours for me but when I picked him up, he said he had fun. They didn't let them out where they said they would and I had told Braedon I would pick him up at the flagpole unless his teacher said something different. When I was walking toward him, he hadn't seen me yet and he kept looking at the flagpole for me. He looked a little nervous but he was fine once he saw me. I also noticed he didn't eat very much lunch so I'm sure he was nervous and excited all at the same time. He'll get better at this as the school year goes on...as will I, I'm sure.