Dedicated To My Hormones

She didn't even look back.
3 seconds after joining the other kids in Miss Jodi's class, she was volunteering to be the "Prayer Helper"...
It is just preschool.
2 days a week.
And I know it's not about me...
It's about her.
And her confidence and her intelligence and her abilities.
And giving her the chance to grow...
But...
It's a little about me.
It is the official end...
I don't have another baby.
This was my last first day of school.

School Daze

Because we enjoy complicating our life as well as acting upon last minute yet surprisingly well thought out decisions, our children have started a new school this year.

We registered on August 27th.

School started on the 5th.

Which required an eleventh hour flurry of testing/transcripts/paperwork/uniform and only 12 or so middle of the night sobbing fits, are we doing the right thing???? from yours truly.

Today I met the headmaster and as he and I were chatting away, a part of my brain kept thinking, I can't believe how much this guy reminds me of Bill Paxton in Big Love... would it be weird to tell him?

I decided that telling the head of your children's Catholic school that he reminds you a polygamist would be bad form.

Jack had a great first day while Jake informed me that, It didn't totally suck.

Day 2 received more positive feedback - Good and fun was the consensus.

Whew.

We left our last school for a number of reasons and it was not an easy decision. I loved the idea of my kids graduating from 8th grade with the kids they had been in kindergarten with...

But, ineffective administration was making the place feel like a junior high and the best interests of the kids began falling behind the best interests of certain highly moneyed parents... a problem not unique to private schools where some adults think the more cash they throw around the more policy they should be allowed to dictate... obviously, it's the school's responsibility to quell this tide, only ours wasn't...

So after a month of summer, a month of stepping back and calmly looking at the big picture, Hugh and I realized that we had to make a change.

We're not alone. 5 kids from Jake's class left as well as 4 from Jack's... considering the school is a 1 class per grade with about 22 kids per class, well that is rather significant.

And so we talked to the kids... and talked and talked to each other some more... and the boys accepted our decision... at the end of the day they really understand that we would never make a choice for them that we didn't believe was for the best; they know they are our priority and they trust us.

We gave them a choice of 2 schools... both excellent and we deferred to their preference (which was secretly ours, but we wanted them to feel as though they had some self determination in this process).

I was told that having a family call and discuss admission a mere month before school begins is highly unusual... thank goodness I have brainiac children so I can walk softly and carry a big report card... turns out they welcomed us with open arms and 47 pages of paperwork.

I know all of you out there with the babies and the sleep deprivation are thinking you are in the hardest part of parenting and maybe, physically you are... but, I am here to warn you that the mental exhaustion... the second guessing... that only gets worse... there are days when I am nothing but exhausted... days when I question every single choice I made... days when I realize I am giving nothing but assvice... days when I make myself shut up.

Yet, I have these wonderful, wonderful children.


*** edited to add***

as of 2:59 pm, 9/8/07, these "wonderful wonderful children" are approximately 11 minutes away from being sent to boarding school!!!