Zoë's 6 and is in 1rst grade, well almost!

Zoë turned 6 years old this morning...what a smart, funny, sincere,
artistic young lady she has become. This morning or last night.. it
became clear that she expected something for her birthday.. and school
was not it.. (reminds me of Auntie Carrie!)... she kept saying
something about Asha coming to her school for her birthday to check it
out.. I kept reminding her that she did have school and that Asha and
Claire after their own days at school would come over for dinner.
Last night I made more than 26 cup cakes for her to take to school...
She had chosen lemon cake with purple frosting and gummy worms on
top.. I added oreo cookie crumbs.. She got to share them with her old
class mates and they all sang happy birthday to her before going into
school. Today was Day 2 of School, a full day (8:38 to 2:41), Day 1
was 9am to 11:30am.. and weirdly this school starts out with the
students in their old class rooms.

this whole school thing has had me in a dither.. all the students
(grade 1-5) are supposed to be in their classrooms tomorrow, after
first recess... apparently this is the same for other schools such as
Hobbs, but Willows students spent the whole day in their new
classrooms starting today. I heard was that they had an unusual
number of new students and they were still sorting the classes.. one
parent who does a lot of PTA
stuff said they have had problems in previous years with say an
English speaking class that was underprescribed and they did
a1rst/2nd year split or something. Another parent told me that the
district has to approve the classroom roles (sizes?) and they were
waiting for that. The fact is the kids did have class in the library
the whole day..with a really, really nice substitute teacher.. Mme
Gardner (her teacher from last year) was busy with orientation and
setting up class distributions for the french
kindergarteners...

When we picked our kids up they were on the playground.. (I found that
disconcerning as well)... I'm going to write a letter to the school
board, principal etc. listing my displeasure.. I've never seen such
and administrative overload of work on the first two days of school..
My friend tells me that it must be nice for the kids to return to
comfort, but I can't help but feel that idea is ridiculous and the
students should just have one day of anxiety, the first day, and not
the whole first week. We were not told of any of this, and as new
parents to 1rst graders I find the whole process atrocious.

That said, Zoe is very happy, all the kids seemed happy, and perhaps
it is just me being more anxious about the whole process. I just want
to know who she has for teacher and get on with the year. I went to
talk to Mme Gardner and it turns out I was going to quite miss her.. I
kind of cried a little.. felt very foolish, but she is such a good
teacher and Zoe's growth and how much she is changing brings me to
tears (happy ones).. its so monumental in some way.

drop off tomorrow is still at the kindergarten line up.. I'm
guessing they are in the library tomorrow again.. at least until
recess. Then when we pick them up, they will finally come out the
first grade door.

It sounded like Zoe had a good day, the only other word I heard was
that Luke called her "Bow-e" (long "o") and I asked her what she did
and she said "I ignored him. But it still hurt my feelings" We have
been talking a lot about how to deal with hurt.. I've given her both
the either ignore it (I too don't like confrontation) and the Gooch
method of annoy the heck of them back.. ie do the copy everything they
say thing to make fun of them, or get even.. "No, you're a Bow-e".. or
make something up. Seems like she is more like me... I just hope she
doesn't internalize like her dad. (you know, save it up, blow up
later).

When we got home, I finished making her choice of Spaghetti Dinner..
with meatballs.. it turned out delicious.. So much so that all three
kids had seconds (which you have to see as quite the accomplishment..
they never, never eat that way; sometimes getting them to eat at all
is a chore... they ate so much, they left no room for crumble and ice
cream.. although they tried to eat some). I seem to have lost my touch
for cooking pasta.. I didn't buy enough.. I'm the opposite of my mom
in that way.

Zoe and the girls and Finn played hard all night.. and really well..
we never had to find something to distract them. Once we said good by
to our friends, I put Zoe in the bath and Finn and I wrapped
presents.. no time like the present (lol). Finn was so excited to
give something to Zoe, he went to the easel and painted her a picture.
They were so cute together and Zoe was sooooo gracious when she got
her gift from him (I think I got video at the tail end of her thanking
him). Really she was so very gracious about all her gifts, ooooh and
awwww all the way, "thank you"s.. "you are the best mom ever, really".
In the end Finn drew two more pictures, and ask Zoe to make one for
him. A mom couldn't be prouder of her two kids.

Tomorrow is only Thursday, two more days of school.. longest week
ever. But it will all work out. But that is not how I want to end
this day. I want to end this day thinking about Zoe, and how she has
changed from that little baby we kept happy in the bouncy seat so she
would sleep, or co-sleeping when we had to... and now a 6 year old,
learning a second language, taking care of her friends, her brother,
and mostly going to sleep on her own.. except on those few nights that
she can't.. like last night.. where she comes downstairs... where I am
watching tv in a very quiet, dark room, she sneaks up on me, drops her
tiny toy stuffie dog on my head, like a spider, and makes me eeeek and
jump.. then giggles herself silly because she got me!