First Day of School Yadda Yadda Yadda

I know, I know, EVERYBODY is doing it, posting their photos of their kids on the first day back to school.  But hey, it's mostly on Facebook (or so I hear), HOWEVER, since I'm no longer on Facebook (I broke free!  I broke free and it's amazing!) I'll have to do it here.  And, I don't think I've EVER made a blog post about the first day of school.  And it's high time I did!

I am soooo thankful to have three little kiddos who LOVE school.  This morning as I was stalking the elementary school waiting to take photos of Noah exiting from his bus, I saw a little boy sobbing his way into school - I ached for that poor little scared fellow.  Or maybe he just had a fabulous summer and didn't want it to end.  MY kids, however, couldn't wait for school to begin.  Did they NOT have a fabulous summer!??!?  Hmmmphh!

Anyway, here's that first AWWWWWWW back to school clothes and backpacks photo.  Although technically these are all last years' clothes and backpacks, but still in excellent and quite useable condition, thank you very much.

Oh, you noticed we're in our back yard, did you?  Yup, Connor refused to have his photo taken in the front yard because he is now in middle school and very mature and evidently has a mature reputation to maintain.  Or create, I suppose.  He's already attempting to master that "guy" pose where you put your fingers underneath your biceps to make them look bigger.

I know this is a dippy and trendy and very over-used family photo pose (bums, people, REALLY?  You'll never see ME in a family photo like that!), but I did it anyway.  Pretty stale, eh?

Second-grader Noah.  Yes, with jam on his face.  AFTER he'd supposedly brushed his teeth.  You did NOT fool me, Noah, you little punky boy.

My little preschool Shellybean.  She went to preschool last year, but THIS year she was riding the bus to preschool.  *cue the beginning of the Mommy tears*

At my behest, Mark followed Connor halfway to his bus stop and hid behind a car to take this sneaky photo.  Which is why it's blurry and awful.  But Connor discovered a 7th grade boy on our street (full of girls) and was ecstatic to have a new friend.

And NO, I did not follow Connor's bus to his middle school and take sneaky photos of him.  But I did drive by and take a photo of his school, knowing he was inside it.  *sniff sniff*

Shelby (looking somewhat nervous but still determined to be in the front of the line, no surprise there) leading the way onto the bus at the bus stop.  I'm frantically trying to take a photo while not blubbering in front of all of our neighbors (to explain the blur).

Here's Noah doing a tap dance off the bus.  Or scratching his bum.  I'm not sure which.  Probably the latter.  *sigh*

And another of Noah, in the flow and catching up with his old buddy from first grade, Tristan.  Noah's my little social bee, a trait NOT inherited from either Mark or myself.  But I do so LOVE that about him, even though his happy socialness gets him in trouble.  Kind of a lot.

And now the Mommy tears were full-on flowing.  Here's Shelbywaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa  *pulls self together*

And this photo…. *self falls apart again*  This will be one of my most-loved Shelby photos for my whole life, I'm sure of it.  *great wailing waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa*

Shelby even had to transfer buses at the elementary school, which greatly perplexed and worried and flat-out terrified me.  But look at her confidently going to her next bus, not needing me AT ALL.    Waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa

And now we're at the preschool.  This is where I full-on went bawling, had to put my sunglasses on and go back and sit in the car for fear of scaring all the little preschoolers with my puffy mascara-streaked face.   One of the parents asked me if I was okay and assumed it was my first child going to preschool.  "Ummmm, noooo blubber blubber blubber she's my third blubber blubber blubber but she's my baaaaaaby waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa blubber blubber"

I finally DID manage to get myself put together enough so that Mark and I could go have a celebratory breakfast at Panera Bread.

And afterward, I made Mark drive by Connor's middle school another time.  And yes, I took another photo.  I'll take what I can get of my beloved much-too-grown-up Connor.  *sigh*

FAST FORWARD ONE HOUR LATER

Shelby is home!  She came off the bus a happy little clam.

BUT Mommy was NOT happy when Shelby came home without her beautiful hair clippie from Grandma. Good thing she has 20 other pink hair clippies.

Shelby also came home on one of the most obnoxious sugar highs EVER.  Oh, cake for preschool snack RIGHT BEFORE you send 'em home?  Gee, thanks for that.  Grrrr!

It was right about here that she remembered something distressing about preschool - "I couldn't play when I got to preschool like I used to get to!  They made me SIT ON THE RUG and WAIT!!!!!"  Mark and I started to cackle at her dramatic, most awfully tragic announcement and then she shrieked, "HEY!  It's not funny!  Stop laughing!  I was MAD!!!! WAAAAAAHHHHH!!!"

A little while later, Connor arrived home and gleefully announced,  "Middle school is AWESOME!!!!!!!"  Which meant MORE Mommy tears.  You see, I'd been stressing (panicking / losing sleep / horrified) about Connor going to middle school for over a year now, ever since he skipped third grade last year and I realized that would mean he'd go into fifth grade in middle school at a wee 9 years old. DARN that kid for being so smart and for growing up so darn fast.  He's in BIG trouble for that.  *waaaaahhhhh* 

And finally, Noah arrived home, happily announcing, "Guess what?!?  I only got in trouble ONE TIME!"  Ummm, that's SUPER, Noah.  Off to a great start!  Ugh!  Looks like second grade may be a repeat of first grade, where I daily dreaded opening up Noah's binder to find what new trouble he had gotten himself into.  Upon finding out he was in trouble for talking (no surprises there) to his new buddy Jacob, we moved his name tag to a more appropriate place.  In school (long long ago), I was a quiet, model student, as was Mark (even longer ago), and I never dreamed that *I* would have THAT kid, the noisy problem child that always gets in trouble.  Where DID Noah come from???  And what the heck do we with DO with him!??!

We had a family dinner at Chili's to celebrate a successful and happy first day of school for all, where the waitresses were amazed that we could devour a Molten Chocolate Lava Cake in 90 seconds flat (look at all those hands and spoons and forks in there!).  Uhhhmmmmm, yeah, we're kind of amazing like that.  Thanks, I think.