Chase's 1st Day of School!

Okay, so it's only preschool and its only two mornings a week, but today was a BIG day for Chase! He was dressed in his bright red polo shirt, khaki shorts with a belt (of course!), and his brand new sneakers, with his white socks pulled way up high like daddy told him to! He proudly wore his new Thomas backpack, with his orange lunchbox inside... and he marched into that school like he was the coolest kid ever. I was so proud! I can't believe he's already in preschool, already learning things that I haven't taught him, sitting at a table with his little friends and eating lunch with them! What a great day.

We've been talking about (and driving past) the school for months. He's always been okay with it, always very excited about it! It helps that his best girl friends Mia and Ava are in his class because anywhere they are, he wants to be too! Those 3 were born within 6 weeks of each other and have been playing together since they were just a few months old. Anyways, he had a great time at his open house last Saturday and we really liked his teacher, so I was not worried at all... until last night! We were talking about school calmly as I was tucking him in, when all of a sudden he burst into tears!! His little bottom lip was quivering and he looked terrified. Our conversation went like this:

me: "Chase what's wrong?!"

him: "School!"

me: "Are you scared of going to school without mommy and daddy?"

him: "YES!!!"

me: "But what about... (insert "Mia and Ava", "the playground", "all of the toys"... everything that he was excited about)??"

him: "NO go to school!"

me: "What would make you feel better?"

him: "Mommy hold you!" (as he threw his arms around my neck!)

*at this point I was DONE... sobbing like a baby! I hated to see him so scared and I knew that we couldn't turn back... he HAD to go to school, if not the next day, then some day...*

him: "Mommy sing a song!"

me: "What song should I sing?"

him: "ABC's!"

After I pathetically cried my way through the ABC's, I asked him if he felt better now. He said yes and then laid down to sleep... although we heard him talking for about another hour.

This morning he was absolutely fine, like nothing had happened! He was excited about school and had no problem leaving us at the door! Afterwards, I went to meet my friends Jackie and Andrea (Ava and Mia's moms) for breakfast. It was so nice to be able to celebrate our kids' first day of school together, after having watched them grow from newborns to big 2 1/2 year olds!

Then, Siena and I went to Target for a nice, leisurely shopping trip without potty breaks! I plan on using my Tuesday and Thursday mornings to run errands, clean the house, and spend more time with Siena, including a free "mommy and me" infant class that I used to take Chase to when he was this age. I'm so excited!

Since I still had some time to spare before picking Chase up, I decided to stop by Arby's and reward myself (for not crying all morning!) with an orange creamsicle shake!! YUM! I felt a little guilty about it, but then I reminded myself that I needed the extra calories for nursing. :)

I pulled into the pick-up line at Chase's school with 10 minutes to spare. He was waiting at the door with his class, with a HUGE grin on his face! I was just thrilled that he was still wearing the same clothes that I dropped him off in! That means no accidents! woo hoo. Of course I asked him a ton of questions about what he did at school today. He's what I got:

"paint a picture"

"Mia has Dora lunchbox"

"take turns on swings"

"push orange things"

"hold yellow circle"

"read book with dolphins and BIG shark!"

"eat turkey and apples. Apples cold"

"have fun!"