And We Survived Day 1

Today was Butterfly's first offical day of preschool. She was excited, doing happy dances while getting ready this morning. I was nervous. What if she missed me? What if she didn't like it? What if she didn't get along with the other kids? What if she didn't have enough time to eat her snack (Butterfly is a slow eater)? For some reason, I allowed these thoughts to run through my mind last night and keep me awake. On the car ride over to the school, Butterfly tells me "I'm not going to miss you. I'm not going to be like LLama (from Llama Llama Misses Momma)." I don't know if I was ever so simultaneously proud and heartbroken. There was the "Yes! My child is independent! She wants to explore the world! We've done a good job!" sentiment running through my head. Which was quickly followed up by the "What do you mean you won't miss me? I'm your mom?!?" I allowed that one to stay around through drop off. Butterfly and I walked to her classroom. I had a funny feeling in the pit of my stomach. No tears, just a bit of melancholy emotion. I helped her find her hook to hang her backpack. I watched her place her lunchbox on the shelf. She came and gave me a hug, and never looked back as she walked into the classroom. And thus began her life seperate from me. My husband was home with Ladybug, so thankfully I didn't have to worry about having 2 kids at drop off. While she was looking for her sister when I returned, Ladybug didn't seem to mind the one-on-one time she's now acquired with mom. We went for a walk, played outside, and had a snack. At pick up, Butterfly was all smiles coming out of her classroom. She was carrying a picture she'd painted of Clifford the Big Red Dog. Painting on the first day of class was sure to win my little artist over. I could tell school had tired her out. She was fuzzy and not forthcoming with the details of the day. Her voice was so quiet, I had to strain to hear her. But once home, a bit rested and after a yummy lunch, details of her day began to creep out. They sang songs, which she sang for us. They read a story about Clifford and in the story he tore up flowers. Butterfly and a classmate who has the same lunchbox had a bit of mix-up, but it was resolved. All in all, it sounded like a pretty good first day of school.