School's in Session

Ethan waiting for the bell to ring on the first day. Too bad we were standing in the wrong area. Thankfully I realized before it was too late.
On our walk to school. We are in a walking district and I just loved watching the cute scene of all the families walking their children to school. Especially along the tree lined streets. One of my very favorite things about living here.
This year Ethan insisted he had a "bag that goes on just one shoulder" that must be "cool" or something, he would know, he's very into "cool".
With his friend Isaac from our ward who moved from Utah just a month before we did. They are in the same class. The weird thing is we registered at different times and didn't request them be together and they still are. Not to mention Isaac's Mom's name is "Tyra" the same as my mom...weird.
Brayton elementary. I love these old schools. This school opened in 1911 so this year we will have the 100 year "celebrayton" get it?

Anna with her new backpack. Kate had to be in on all the pictures and it was making Anna so mad.
Does she look nervous? She kept saying her tummy hurt, poor thing.

I think this is a pretty cute candid shot.

Kate needed her turn too of course.

These pictures were taken walking home from school orientation. This was totally candid and I was trying to push the stroller find the camera and take pictures all at the same time. It was just a sweet moment the two of them holding hands strolling down the street.

I absolutely love Anna's school. It is called Jefferson. I don't know what year it was built but it's pretty old too. She actually attends the primary school behind the elementary school.

The "primary center" has pre-k and kindergarten only. They even have their own principal. They have hand sanitizing stations about every 5 feet in that building and outside every door and classroom. Pretty smart I think.


I love the old architecture and spire above the school.
Yesterday 4:45 am. I'm awake wondering what our day's going to bring. We have been counting down the days for school to start since well... school let out. Ok, so it's not been that bad, but we have had an extremely long summer and I think we were all ready for the kids to have school start again. I didn't really want to get out of bed but Jane started to cry signaling me to crawl out of bed. I fed her and decided I don't have any more excuses not to get myself into a good routine as well. I did some reading, exercised for 30 minutes, showered and was ready for the day by 7am. An awesome start to the school year if I may say.

We all got out the door in great time and everything was going great, until I starting thinking. Thinking about my little boy who is now 8 years old and going to a new school in a new place where the teachers may not have the same values and morals and won't love my little man the way we do. I wondered if he would struggle, if kids would be mean, what if he's teased? I started to loose it. So in an attempt to over compensate I quickly said out-loud and with a tad too much enthusiasm "you're going to have a great day!" An attempt I'm sure to convince myself that he would be fine. And fine he was.

At 3 o'clock when the bell rang I was right outside waiting for him. I wanted him to know I was there just in case he had a hard day and needed me. He came out with a smile on his face like no biggie. The school has a tradition of having a "popsicle party" right after the bell the first day. It is meant to be a little fun thing for the kids and a chance for parents to informally meet the teacher. It was a total joke. There were mobs of people and the teacher's didn't have name tags on or anything. I never even saw Ethan's teacher, still don't have a clue who she is.

The worst part of the day starts now. Ethan and Isaac head over to get their popsicle, and that's when I lose him somewhere in the crowd of people. He knew we needed to hurry so we could go pick up Anna from her school across town. I had a 15 minute window. I looked everywhere forever trying to find Ethan but couldn't see him anywhere. I was starting to panic. I needed to be on my way to get Anna but didn't want to leave Ethan. I thought he may be looking for me too so didn't want to leave. I finally called my friends house who lives just down the street. She answered and said Ethan was there. I was so mad/relieved. I started just running down the street to get everyone in the car to get Anna. Don't mind the crazy lady with the double stroller. We all jumped in the car and got over to Anna's school just as my "window" for pick up time was closing. I was so worried she would be the last to be picked up and think I had "forgotten" her on her first day. Thankfully she was oblivious and all was well. The only bad thing was when I picked her up they told me I forgot to pack her a snack. I was thinking "what?" I was never told anything about a snack. I thought to myself that would have been a nice thing to tell me at orientation! Anyway, now I know.

On that note, Ethan is also asked to pack a snack everyday. The principal is a big believer in fueling your brain and says that some of the kids go 5 hours between breakfast and lunch and they can't learn or pay attention well when they are hungry and their blood sugar is low. I think it actually makes a lot of sense. Another thing they are big on here is reusing, recycling etc. We are asked not to use brown bags because that is "waste". Even juice boxes are frowned upon. We are asked to have them have a reusable water bottle in their bag at all times. They are pretty extreme on somethings but I also think it's good, just another little adjustment. They have a whole "green" committee at school to help the students be more aware of how to reduce, reuse, recycle.

So, on the whole we had a good first day. No big trauma's oh, other than as we were putting Ethan to bed last night he said he hadn't done his homework. I told him to forget about it and he totally freaked out saying how he's in 2nd grade now and he'll be in so much trouble. Truthfully I didn't even ask him if he had homework because I thought there was no way he would on the first day. Thankfully it was just some journaling, and he was able to get it done quickly.

On another note. I thought I would just be the perfect mom yesterday and have freshly baked chocolate chip cookies and nice home cooked meal for the kids when we walked in the door. I had planned to make the cookies with Kate in the afternoon while the kids were gone so we could spend some quality one on one time. Problem was when we got to the egg's portion of the recipe I realized I didn't have any. Whoops. Then after the mix up with Ethan and picking him up late, then Anna late I had thought we would pick up eggs on the way home, but by then poor Jane was starving and it wasn't an option. Skip to today and again Kate and I were having our bonding time making the cookies having gone to the store this morning to get eggs. Go down the recipe only to realize, yep no baking soda! Seriously?! I had two things of baking powder but no soda. I even knocked on my landlords door to ask her, I was that desperate but she wasn't home. I called a friend who lives not far from here and no answer. So I put the almost complete dough in the fridge, until I could get some baking soda. I got some from the friends where I pick up Ethan and then came home. By then the dough was too cold to mix the soda in so I had to basically let it thaw all afternoon until I could mix it in. By 7 o'clock tonight we finally had our not so fabulous cakey cookies. The dough was so gooey compared to Utah that I kept adding flour and they weren't that fabulous. At least I gave the good college try, right?