First Day at School. Piece of Cake!

I'm so pleased because Chloe had a brilliant first day at school.

We even managed to start off in the morning on a high note. Normally, she isn't a big fan of breakfast. She'll pick at her food or just have something tiny like half a slice of toast and some juice, but this morning she sat happily and munched through a bowl of weetabix, some strawberries and a glass of apple juice in about 15 minutes.

We managed to get the uniform on without any problems. She didn't grow six inches over night so everything still fit.

And she looked so cute wearing it. She knows it too.




We walked to the school and I was a little concerned because she was really happy the entire way, but as soon as we reached the top of the steps and the P1 courtyard was in front of us she hesitated, just for a split second but it was there. Usually Chloe is the type of kid to run into any situation with both guns blazing and its a very rare sight to see her unsure of herself. On the few occasions its happened before she has went one of two ways. Either she shrugs it off and runs on anyway, or she falls to pieces, wants a hug and refuses to carry on. Thankfully today was a good day.



After a few minutes one of the women from her old daycare arrived with three kids she recognised as friends and they played together for five minutes or so before her new teacher opened the door to their cloakroom and invited them in.

After that I didn't get a look in.


I managed to squeeze past some of the other mums into the cloakroom to give Chloe her little envelope for the snack scheme just in time to hear her teacher ask her name and for Chloe to reply "I'm the butterfly". I took both of us a second to realise that she'd spotted her hanger with her name and a picture of a blue and purple butterfly above it.

She was only in school today for a bit less that 3 hours and she'll start her full days of 3.5 hours tomorrow. We collected her shortly after noon and she talked a mile a minute the whole way home, even making us stop in the street every now and again while she explained something in spite of the heavy rain.



Best of all she's really excited to be going again tomorrow and that she will be able to go every day. I've heard stories of some kids arriving home from school saying about how brilliant it was, but what do you mean I have to go again tomorrow I thought that was it. So its really good that she understands that it isn't a one off thing.

Oh and I'm to tell you that her teacher gave her a spider sticker which says "Very Good Work" because she was able to write her own name on a painting of the three of us. I'm blue, Dad's yellow and Chloe's green but because those things tend to come home in bundles at the end of term, that's all I know about the painting for the minute.

I hope everyone else planning for the first day of school this year have just as good a day.

Firsts and Lasts

I don't think it has quite sunk in yet that today is Chloe's last Friday as a preschooler. Which also means that we have a total of six last such&suchadays left before she starts school this coming Thursday.

Once Thursday has come and gone it will be seven years before another big change in her life. Seven looooong years before we her last ever Primary School Friday and then she'll be off to secondary school.

It amazes me just how quickly the milestones slow down and grow fewer and farther between.

I still remember when these little changes flew towards and past me, sometimes like machine gun fire, it was difficult to recover from the last one before being hit by the next.

Like the day I could have taken off full pelt, fists in the air for a lap of honour around the block because she'd finally taken a full 8oz at a feed. The first time she slept right through the night without waking. Her first tooth. The day what I thought was colic disappeared forever and I finally realised that my little girl's wind went down rather than up and I'd just been patting the wrong end for the last two weeks.

Her first night away from home. Her first birthday. Her first dentist appointment and her first hair cut. Her first smile, first giggle and of course, her first tantrum.

She tried her new uniform on this morning again because firstly I wanted to be sure that she hadn't mysteriously grown half a foot overnight (it happens) and secondly because I just wanted to see her in it again. Her face lights up when she wears it and she looks so grown up.

So now we're down to her last six days as a preschooler, but there will be many days to come after that. The world isn't coming to an end, just a small part of her life and each of those days to come will be just as special as the last and we're looking forward to each and every last one of them.