First Day, Hooray!

Today was Ezra's first day of kindergarten. We've already discussed my sad feelings on the matter, so let's leave that behind and focus on the through the roof feelings of excitement in this house today. He's been waiting for August 31 for a looooong time, folks!

We don't have bus service to our house since we live .7 miles from the school. Today we walked to school to drop him off. Walked back home. Then walked back to school to pick him up, and back home with him. That was enough walking to convince me that maybe we don't need to do that every day. That and the fact that I was dumb enough to start a new Jillian Michaels workout video this morning. Quite frankly, I was real worried that I might burn more calories than I consumed for once in my life. To fix that little problem, Caroline and I made cookies this afternoon. Special cookies with a lot of butter, a lot of cocoa, a lot of sugar and a lot of Reece's pieces. I'm pretty sure I didn't lose any weight today. On second thought, maybe we really should walk both times every day!The above photos were actually from yesterday just before we went to the Open House to meet his teacher and see his classroom.
This photo was today just before we left for class. The book he is holding--The First Day of School--was mine as a little girl. My mom has a picture of me holding it on my first day of kindergarten. She has the same picture of at least one of my brothers as well. And when I taught first grade, I would read that book to my students on the first day.
Lined up and ready to go. This is where my eyes were watering a bit. But there were other parents with the same problem. I wanted to let loose and sob my eyes out. But I didn't want to scare Ezra...or the girls.
And he's gone. Disappeared into 13 years of formal education in the public school system.
This is how we found him at the end of the day.
After we got home from school I did a little first day interview with Ezra. Here's what we got:
Mommy: Did you have fun today at your first day of kindergarten?
Ezra: Yeah.
M: What's your teacher's name?
E: Mrs. Thomson
M: Do you like her?
E: Yeah, I had a fun time.
M: What was your favorite thing today?
E: I had fun at recess.
Caroline: Did anybody hurt you?
E: No, I didn't get hurt today.
Caroline: Did anybody in your class get hurt?
E: No, not today?
E: But you want to know something sad? There was a boy in my class who was born without a leg. So he had a metal leg!
M: Awesome! And he can run around on it?
E: Yeah, it's pretty cool.
E: There was a pretty big rug. I had a fun time.
M: Did you make any new friends?
E: Yeah. I can't remember a lot of names though. There was Diesel. And Gavin.
M: What did you like about your new teacher?
E: She's pretty nice.
E: There was a boy in my class who just cried and cried and didn't want to be there.
E: I was so happy to be there and it was super fun. I thought I would be embarrassed and shy, but I wasn't.
M: You excited to go back tomorrow?
E: Yeah!
Seems like just yesterday that Ezra was the size Nora is now! Good thing he has afternoon kindergarten so that Nora can still snuggle with her brother in the mornings.