First Days of School

Saben's first day of school, Annika's was the next day, but we're going to count this picture as "first days" anyways.

S: "Annika, did you make any friends today?"
A: "I don't know...."
S: "Did you learn anyone's name?"
A: "No"
S: "Do you want to make friends Annika?"
A: "Yah"
S: "Ok. Here is what you do. First you start playing with somebody. Then you need to ask them what their name is. Then they might ask you what your name is too! And then you will be friends! And you can maybe even invite them to your birthday party!"

By far my favorite conversation this week, it was soooo cute. I love it when Saben enters his "teaching" mode with Annika, and especially that he always starts it by asking her questions. And he always affirms her if she gets the right answer too. He's done it to teach her about planets, moons and stars and several other topics. So cute.

By now you should know, the pictures only get crazier from here. This is the one I got when I was super serious "Ok, YOU GUYS NEED TO LOOK AT ME AND SMILE. NOW. QUIT MESSING AROUND!"

On Monday, Saben had his first day of Kindergarten. I almost lost it at our orientation day and felt sort of choked up at the first day, but they kept us parents busy showing our kids around the school so I managed to get him dropped off without a single tear.

Of course Saben was super excited, he told me after our orientation day last week "mom, I like kindergarten better than our house" and "Why can't we stay at kindergarten mom?" On the first day he just ran to the lego table and never looked back. When we picked him up, he did remark on how long the day was and said he was ready for a nap practically, but on his second day, he didn't seemed fazed by it at all.

First day of kindergarten, Saben was most excited to tell me about the friend he made. (Enoch) On the second day, he leapt into the car excitedly telling me about this amazing thing called a calculator. He was soooo excited and was trying to figure out if you can type a googol out onto it. He had also drawn this long list of numbers, just like a calculator.


On Tuesday, Annika had her first day of preschool and I had my first 3 hours alone without either kid. Dropping her off was a lot harder. She is most likely one of the youngest in the class. Her preschool changed locations over the summer and it was still messy & chaotic inside. It's functional, but they are obviously still working on it, lots of 1/2 completed projects.

Annika was super excited though. Making her lunch for school was super funny, she was just thrilled by it and wanted everything in her lunch box. Then when we arrived, she got pretty shy and clung to my leg. We did a puzzle together and she told me it was ok for me to leave in five minutes. When I waved goodbye to her from the doorway, she had on her super serious stoic face...you could tell she was trying so hard to be brave but was pretty scared. Of course I did shed a few tears at that point. Saben was always so easy because he was thrilled to be there. I can't imagine how the people with the screaming kids do it.

Annika's "stoic face"

Annika did have a really good time, but she ran to me and hugged me for a long time when I came to pick her up. She told me she played dress-up (as a fairy princess) with the other girls, painted, used playdough and read stories.

As for me...Well I spent my glorious 3 hours alone hacking back all my plants so the painting guys can get to our house. Awesome.