Jets Jets Jets

Last week was Luke's first week of school...well, he went for 1 hour on Tuesday with 1/2 his class and then another hour on Thursday, so maybe this week is his first full week.

The first day I brought him in and he found his name right away (yay smarty pants) and then he was off to play.

I eased out the door and went home to wash the floor with my 40 minutes of free time. after I picked him up he told me he cried. He was happy when I picked him up, so i think it was just for a few minutes.

Then Thursday I brought him in and before we were even in the door, he was screaming! I mean screaming! The "angel" in the classroom (one of the old laides from the church) came over and tried to play with him and they gently told me to leave...I was out the door fast, but hung out for a few minutes before the screaming died down.

When I went to pick him up I was floored to be handed not only a project, but two drawings! I was so happy to see that he was participating!! he told me he didn't sit for circle time, but watched. I know it will be just a matter of time before he is excited to go.

We'll see what tomorrow brings! First full 2 hours. Hope he remembers what he said last week "It's not a bad school".

Labor Day 1

For our first night of Labor day, we went all out with a lobster dinner (even though Luke and Olivia kept calling them crabs). Olivia loved the lobster, but not all the work (it's worth it Olivia!!) Luke ate spagetti-os.
Saturday we headed to the orchard for a sunflower maze and some apple picking. The apples were pretty bad, most had been attacked by bugs, and a lot were rotting on the ground (stinky!) They called them "hail kissed" from a hail storm they had a little while ago. I still didn't pick those. The better apples are in the fall!

The Sunflower maze was fun, the kids loved it (and there was a trivia quiz to go with it) and luckily we made it out to go and buy some apple cider.

Tomorrow we go hiking!

One Week Down

So, I expected Thursday to be a hard day of Olivia not wanting to go to school because she was tired...boy was I wrong. I guess I knew deep down that Olivia likes to have an active day, but for her to go to school for FIVE days in a row, 6.5 hours each...and not to be super tired by Friday morning was pretty amazing! She seems to like school. OK, she LOVES it.
Everyday I pick her up and she is so happy and barely wants to leave her friends.
The classroom is much more culturally diverse than she is used to (me too for that matter) but it doesn't seem to phase her. She has made a lot of friends. Enough that when we leave the class, about 1/2 the kids who are still there (a lot of them stay until 5 each day...wow) are trying to hug her or say goodbye to her. It's really rewarding to see how well she seems to be doing!
She gets a report everyday on how she's doing and everyday she gets a check that she's doing "great" (I had no doubts about that one!).
Her teacher seems to be warming up a tiny bit. She still seems a bit off to me (maybe it's because she's pregnant). Today I wondered if she is that way because the school may have a no touching policy...maybe she can't hug them or anything because of that...or maybe I'm analyzing her too much! She just seems a bit cold. I'm sure she's stressed out for the first week of school.
So far she's had a music class, drama class and art class. I think she liked drama the best, though music was a very close second. She's already learning how to hold the violin.
So far I've noticed that only about 1/3 of her class can write their own names. I do try to remind myself that even in her other preschool, they don't start this until the 4's, so it's not like the rest of the class is behind.
Homework starts next week...that should be interesting! And I know she's really excited to start dance class too!

School Days

Can it be here already? First day of school came to our house today. Olivia is starting at a new school today, The Kinsella Magnet School of Hartford. I had a lot of trepidation before school started. She's going from 7:45 to 2:15 (aah!) and it's in Hartford...so it's not at all what she has experienced in the past. But, it's Olivia...one of the most adaptable children ever (are you listening Luke??). So, she psyched herself up for the first day (seeing the dance halls, piano rooms and the theatre really got her pumped) and went to school with a great attitude. We hung out for the first 1 1/2 hours to see how it went. They met in their rooms and then headed to breakfast.

It was really hard to stand back and let her do it all on her own, but I won't be there with her everyday, so I had to let her get her own food. She did well with her drinks and bagel. But, she was confused (as was I) at why she had graham crackers for breakfast. She ate them.

After that they all got their balloons with cards attached with their names on them and headed off to the annual balloon launch. This is something they've been doing for years (despite the fact that tons of birds have probably choked on those balloons!) and this year it was special because they just opened the doors to the new school (literally they were pulling the stickers off of things as we visited the other day! We unpacked toys for the teacher). The mayor was there for the opening as well as some VIPs from donating corporations (Travelers Insurance and CL&P) and 2 news crews (I did sort of miss doing shoots when I saw them doing their stuff). It was pretty cool to see all the balloons go up and the kids were really excited (except the kids whose balloons got stuck in the trees...or didn't get off the ground!).

After the launch, we waved goodbye and left her there for the rest of the day. When I picked her up I got the typical conversation.

What did you guys do?

I don't know...played.

Did you read a story?

No, my teacher doesn't read (not true)

What did you eat for lunch

I don't know...something silly

I might have to ask the teacher what they did just to give her a prompt!

UConn Dairy Farm

Growing up with a farm up the street, it's easy to take for granted seeing cows up close, but kids really seem to like viewing farm animals. We headed to the UConn Dairy Farm the other day to get some icecream and see the cows being milked. I didn't get to see much of the milking because Luke decided to have a panic attack as soon as the cows came into view. But he rallied for the horses, and really came all out for the ice cream!

fun with the cousins

Our best attempts at getting all four in a picture. Not too bad...

We thought it would be fun to make a cake for everyone's birthdays since we don't get to spend them together. The kids had fun "frosting" the cake which consisted of lots of stabbing and licking of spoons. The cake was definitely a "masterpiece" when it was done! Between the frosting and the layers of sprinkles it was sugar heaven!