Big Boy School - Week 1 Down

 This past Monday marked Big's first day of "Big Boy School" aka a preschool class at a daycare center. Big and Little have been attending in home child care with a women in our neighborhood for about the past year. And although she is great, Big was just outgrowing her. We made the decision a few month ago that we would move him back to the center he attended as an infant, and leave Little where he was at. Although it breaks my heat a little to separate The Brothers, I also realize that they are different people with different needs and Big just needed to be somewhere more structured and academic.

We started preparing for the transition a few weeks ago by waving to the center when we drove by, talking about how totally awesome Big Boy School was going to be, and reading a few books on the subject (ever the social worker, I know). However, the real down to business prep work started about a week before the first day when we found his old nap mat in his closet. Big decided he needed to "practice" taking a nap on his mat. He seemed to get it down pretty quickly - practice complete. Here he is practicing his nap. Yes, he is fake sleeping. It wouldn't have been a very realistic run through if he'd kept his eyes open, right?

With nap practice complete we were ready to embark on the real thing. So bright and early Monday morning we packed up the backpack with some extra underwear, shorts, and of course Pacy Dog, took the mandatory "1st day of school picture" (see below) and headed out the door. The teacher in his room had known him when he attended before and her initial reaction upon seeing him again was "wow, he slimmed down". This boy was apparently know for his size and if you've seen my little shorty you know I don't mean his height. Anyways, he put down his stuff, checked out some toys and some kids and seemed ready to roll. It was only when I called him back over to say good-bye (ever the social worker, I am not sneaking out on my kid) that he teared up a bit. The report at pick up was good though, he calmed down easily, played, took a nap, and generally survived day 1.

As tradition in my family calls for we decided to celebrate a successful first day of school with some after dinner ice cream. For the record this banana split was for all of us to share. Also for the record Big and Little at most of it. I suppose it was well deserved though, and why not let your younger brother piggy-back on your success? 

Since Monday we've been going strong. He usually cries when we leave but calms down once we are out of the building and he sees that it's a lost cause. He teacher says that he is doing very well and was surprised at how well he helped the other children clean up. Yes, you read that right. Apparently he got to watch a puppet show the other day and today was Splash Day. Not a bad first week and for the record his little brother has also survived being away from him.