first day of school.

today was one of the hardest days of my life.

we have been preparing for this day all summer... yesterday we peeked into their backpacks 6 million times, and named all the school supplies they had all ready for school. they were ready. i was not.

last night i got just about ZERO sleep. it was miserable. i tossed and turned all night worrying about all the things that would go wrong, and how they would take it all.

this morning we got up, got ready, peeked into the backpacks one last time, packed a special lunch for Sissy, took a couple pictures, and head out the door on our way to school...

we got to school, and went to Sissy's class first. she has the cutest 2 teachers ever, and i could not be more thrilled about them. cute kids were surrounding her, and she was feeling a little bit shy at first... her teacher walked over and starting talking to her, telling her how cute her skirt and flower were, and that was it. she was fine. i gave her and kiss, and me & jade headed out the door. she didn't even watch me leave, she was already to busy playing.

then we went over to jade's class, his teacher met us at the door, and jade gave her all his school supplies, he was really excited to show her all his things, and she seemed equally excited...

then he turned, looked at me, and said goodbye.

WHAT THE HECK?!?!

where did my baby go? this is the baby boy that just last year i had to stay with at preschool for 6 straight months.... and now he just turns and says goodbye??

i stood there, a little confused (i was honestly ready to sit there with him for an hour or two until he was ready to leave) and then the teacher asked him to sign in, and write his name (he doesn't know how to write his name) he confidently walked over to the sign in sheet, "wrote" his name (wrote some cute little characters) and said to me, "that's a 'J'" it was so sweet, then he looked at me again, and said "okay bye!"

so i left...

well sort of. i walked out into the hall, and spent the next 5 minutes, pacing the halls/peeking in at him. he was fine.

it was the strangest feeling.

both my babies went to school. i was all alone.

i went out into the hall, and saw the sweet preschool director, she asked me how it went (because she knew how worried i was about it all) and i seriously could not get words out of my mouth. i said, "i can't even talk about it right now" and ran outside... barely made it to my car... and burst into tears...

i cried all the way home, ran in to the house, and cried harder.

did i mention they were BOTH at school?? like here I am 25 years old the mother of 2 children, and somehow I am already alone at home... how did this happen? how did they grow up so fast?

the house felt SO empty.

i forced myself to work, and actually got a ton done. it's amazing how much easier it is to work when the kids aren't around. this will be really good for me, give me some time to get work done without distraction... give me a minute alone to breath, today it was just hard, but i know it will end up being such a good thing.

also i know how absolutely amazing this is going to be for the kids. jade took a huge step today, and i know it will only get better.

cam & i picked up jade at noon, and he had done AMAZING. he had so much fun, and told us all about his day. he read books, colored, glued, learned about the letter A, played at the playground, played with the kitchen, he got a special pencil that says "welcome to school" from his teacher, colored a booklet about the first week of school, and got his first homework assignment. it was awesome.

then at 2:30 we went and picked up Sissy. same thing, she had so much fun, her school is more playing than jade, and she gets to stay longer, and eat lunch and take a nap because she only goes once a week. so she took a nap on her little nap mat, ate all of her lunch, she told me about her little friend that is a girl, but she doesn't remember her name, and they played with a bouncy ball together... it was sweet watching her try to remember everything about her day.

so it was a hard day, but wow, this is going to be such a great thing...

for all of us...