The little guy's turn

Months ago we made the decision that Mason would start preschool this fall. I know most children don't start until age 3, but we knew he needed it. His only real socialization has been with Aubrey and her friends, with the occasional child his own age thrown in. The preschool Aubrey attended offers a 2-year old program and we loved the school so much with her we had no hesitations in sending Mason there as well. I sent the registration form in the same day I got it in February and didn't realize quite how fast those 7 months would fly by us. Before I knew it, I was getting an email with teacher assignments and supply lists. We prepped Mason all summer by telling him he was going to Aubrey's old school in the fall and he seemed pretty excited each time we talked about it. He always wanted to stay in her classroom and play when we dropped him off so we knew it wouldn't be a big change for him.

We went to open house a few weeks before the big day. He was so excited to finally play with the toys he coveted during Aubrey's preschool days. In fact, he was the child screaming when it was time to go because he wanted to keep playing. It seemed a little surreal to me to see his name on the board and see a little spot for his backpack and jacket. I tried to keep reminding myself it was just preschool and this was a good thing, but that lump still formed in the back of my throat. 2 open houses in 2 days made this momma a mushy mess.

Unfortunately, we had to wait almost 2 weeks between open house and the first day of school. He asked me everyday if it was time to go to school and would get downright mad when I told him it wasn't.

Finally, his big day arrived. Unlike all the other first days of school, it was just him and me taking pictures. He wasn't as excited to take pictures by himself as he had been with Aubrey, but I managed to get a few.

When we got to the preschool, he wasn't quite sure about everything without Aubrey and Todd being there. He pulled my hand to the table to look at some toys and then seemed ok. He ran off to look at other toys and I had to call him back to give him a hug and kiss bye. I was a little sad that he didn't seem too bothered by the fact that I was leaving. My little boy is quite the big kid now and that's a tough pill to swallow. 

I had to go straight to work after I dropped him off, so my mom picked him up after school and said he had a great day. He was excited to show me his school work when I saw him later that afternoon, but otherwise didn't seem to care as much about the big day. 

Now that we have 2 weeks under our belt, I would say he is doing a great job. He's still a little unsure of himself when we get there, but that lasts about 15 seconds before he runs off to play with the toys. He always seems happy at the end of the day so I think he's enjoying it. 

So, both of my kiddos are officially school kids now. I have kept myself busy with errands while they are both at school because I don't think I'm quite ready to be at home by myself yet. I'm sure I'll get used to the quiet, but for now I'll just enjoy the kid-free time while I shop and distract myself from the fact my kids are getting older by the minute.

August 2014

I am just sitting down to write this post in the middle of the month because the last month has been insane. I am really having to go back and think about August and hope pictures jog my memory because we have been so crazy that I struggle to remember what happened this morning, let alone last month.

We started out the month by getting Aubrey a new, bigger girl bed. Todd didn't think she really needed a full size bed, but I knedw when we convert Mason's bed from the toddler bed to the full it would be an issue if Aubrey was still in a twin bed. I finally convinced him to let us pull the trigger on the bigger bed by telling him it could serve as a guest bed when people spend the night and Aubrey can sleep on the air mattress. I furiously pinned ideas for her new room but I should know by now that my opinions don't mean a whole lot to a very opinionated 5-year old. She picked out the bedding by herself, which actually ended up saving me a lot of money because I wanted the cute PBK set and she chose a set from Target. No complaints from me, though. We settled on a pretty wrought iron-looking bed from Ikea and she loved it. After we assembled the bed and put it all together, it just seemed even more surreal that my little girl is sleeping in that big bed. Didn't I just put her in the crib for the first time? She loves her big bed and it is pretty cute to see her crawling in at night. 

However, Aubrey didn't even get to sleep in her new bed the first night it was assembled because she hosted her first sleepover that night. She had been hounding me for months to have a sleepover so finally I caved and let her do it. She invited 5 friends, but luckily only 3 came over to play and 2 spent the night. I planned a few activities for them, but mostly just let them play and do their thing. Todd went to visit his sister for her birthday, so I called in my sister as reinforcement. That turned out to be one of the better ideas I had because Mason was a handful that night after having no nap that afternoon. The girls had so much fun, but this momma was worn out by the time they went to sleep at 10:30. 

We made the decision this month it was time to convert Mason's crib to the toddler bed. He was started to pull up on top of the crib rails and I knew it was only a matter of time before he crawled over. After talking about it for weeks, we finally cleared his room of the crawl-worthy furniture and did the conversion. He wasn't sure what to think about it at first, but he went to sleep with zero problems the first night. It took him 3-4 weeks before he would get out the bed without permission. Since he insists on sleeping with his door open, we installed the baby gate at his door to keep him confined should he wake up and start wandering. I'll admit that knowing we'll never use the crib again was a little sad, but it is nice to give him some freedom and know that he's safe. 

We took the kids to watch a Charlotte Knights' baseball game in their new stadium and it was a lot of fun. It was Mason's first baseball game and he was fascinated. They both got bored after about 3-4 innings, but hopefully they'll have more attention span to watch the games as they get older. We'd love to go to Atlanta next year to watch the Braves game and hope to take them with us.

We spent a few days on the boat this month while Todd and his dad worked on the dock. The water still seemed a little cool for the kids to swim in so decided to let them fish. Mason was so happy to catch his first little fish. Aubrey was able to help a lot more with her fish and still seemed giddy excited every time she caught one. Todd loves that they both like to fish so I see that as some daddy-children bonding time in the future.

The kids also spent some time in the wading area at the lake and had a great time. 

The day after Aubrey's Kindergarten open house was Mason's open house for preschool. He was so excited to finally be going to school like Aubrey. Many of the children in the class were petrified to leave their parents sides during open house, but not my child. He was too happy about having a whole new set of toys to play enjoy. He did pull us around to show us the toys, but was really ok playing by himself. He was very upset when it was time to leave, so I was confident he was ready for his first day. Unfortunately, he had to wait over almost 2 weeks before he actually got to start and he let us know he wasn't happy to wait. 

This was the best picture of him I could get at open house. He was too interested in the toys to take pictures.

Aubrey started back to dance this month and as promised, we also let her start tumbling at Mrs. Rhonda's. She still isn't 100% happy that she is tumbling there instead of her old gymnastics center, but she has friends in her class and that seems to help. The only drawback to tumbling is the schedule. She dances from 4-5 and then tumbling is from 6:15-7:15. This makes Wednesdays a loooong day for all of us. I now understand and appreciate even more the sacrifice my parents made for me to be in the activities I was in as a child. She is doing something she loves and that makes the long days completely worth it to me.

I'd love to be anticipating a slow-down, but I know that won't happen anytime soon. We are at break-neck wide open speed until Christmas, I'm sure.  So, we'll just try to hang on and make it through until then.