First Day!!

It has been an emotional day around here! Joshua woke up this morning and soon began telling me how much he didn't want to go to school today and how much he wanted me to stay there with him. I knew it was going to be rough. He was trying to eat breakfast, but every time someone mentioned school, he'd shake his head and try hard not to cry. And then I realized this wasn't going to be so easy for me either! I had been super excited for him to make this step, but I just hate to see him so scared and sad. So he stuffed in the rest of his breakfast, grabbed his stuff, we got this picture of him--which really captured the moment-- and headed off to school.

I managed to distract him somewhat in the car with a game of "would you rather"...as in "would you rather eat a plate of dirt or go to kindergarten?" or "would you rather wrestle a snake or go to kindergarten?" He answered "no" to everything, but it still amused him a bit. But as we pulled up to the school, I heard his sighs and as soon as we parked, he started bawling and refused to get out of the car....at which point I had my own little breakdown. And my first thought was to get right back in the car and forget about this whole going off to school thing! But then reason kicked in and I realized that it wouldn't be the best way of teaching my children how to deal with tough things! Plus, one of the reasons for doing kindergarten there was so Joshua and I wouldn't hide ourselves away at home, avoiding any situation that may stretch us.

So somehow in the midst of loading Gray up with some stuff to take to class, Joshua and I managed to pull ourselves together. But Joshua was holding tightly to my hand and not about to let go. We finally got all his stuff together and I tried detaching from him, but he began crying again. It all culminated with him tearfully calling after me while his teacher held him and me rushing from the room crying. Really held it all together, didn't I?

I don't think I got through 5 minutes of the day without checking the clock and thinking about my sweet boy. Finally it was time to pick him up and we were thrilled to hear his teacher say he was fine when I left and had a great day. He has told us little bits here and there about things he did and he even said that everything was fun! He was kind of bouncing off the walls actually! I think he is feeling really relieved that school is not as bad as he thought, though he says he doesn't know yet if he likes his teachers or if he'll be excited to go back tomorrow. We shall see!

It sure was quiet around here without Joshua. I think Gray was feeling a little lost and he sure didn't know what to think about his crying brother and Mama. He is super excited for his chance to go to school and in the meantime, we'll do some school around here. It is definitely different (in a good way) to focus completely on him during his school time. I think it will be a good year for us, even though we'll really miss Joshua!