Prolonging the Magic.

Hello all my devoted readers. First off, I'd like to say, school has been officially "in" for almost a week. And I still stand firm in the belief that school sucks. I had the same opinion when I was in school. And life comes full circle, it seems.
The kids are enjoying their classes and teachers thus far. The first day was actually really hard for me. I got up early with Riley and Cole while Jeff and Syd slept. They picked out their first day clothes like the week before, and were ready to go an hour earlier than they needed to be there. As I've done for the previous years, I made them pose for pictures before they left for their first day. And for some reason, they weren't excited about it as I was.I told them to hold up the correct amount of fingers for the year they'd be in school. However, Cole thought that first grade was more worthy of a "thumbs up", rather than a forefinger. After Riley not so nicely told Cole that he didn't pose correctly for the first picture, he changed his pose for the above shot. From there we took one more shot so we could document their super-cool backpacks, and we were off.When we walked into the building, I was afraid we'd be late because Springville has so much construction going on that there weren't any open roads next to the school. (Last year the construction company said they'd for sure have everything around the school working and open....but, whatever. I'm not overly surprised).
Anyway, we were a little early. We decided that since Cole and Riley's rooms are as far apart as they could possibly get in their school, Riley and I would drop Cole off, and then she'd go pick him up at the end of the day to show him where to meet me or Jeff. Cole fortunately got Riley's first grade teacher, Mrs. Golding. I honestly love her--she's peppy and kind and very unafraid of me. (Unlike his last teacher...whom didn't like me from the start. I'm also very happy to say that we didn't start this year off with ANY of the fiascoes that were encountered last year).
So I took Cole to Mrs. Golding's room, expecting to take pictures and maybe get a little misty...but instead he saw his name on one of the desks, said, "Bye Mom", and then sat down without looking at me again.I was really tempted to go and make him hug me and give him a kiss in front of everyone there. But then I realized that perhaps he was just going to be my sweetie-pie, handsomest boy in the world at home, and just Cole, at school. So I told him I loved him and to have a great day, and goodbye. And he whispered "See ya, Mom". And then we left. Sadly.
Riley tried to cheer me up as we walked across the building to her classroom. "He's probably just nervous, Mom". I appreciated her concern and tried to get over the fact that my baby boy is growing up--taking solace in the fact that my sweet baby girl is still there for me.
"Mom, no one else has their parents here". That was her first comment to me outside of her classroom between telling friends she'd pass in the hallway, "Hi". I refused to think about that and told her to go stand next to her door and point to the m&m that had her name on it.
She sorta rolled her eyes and told me that she's "kind of too old" to be doing this, and she wanted to go into her room. I told her that she was hurting my feelings and that she needed to at least pretend that she was having fun with me here for the pictures. Because she's Riley, she felt really bad that she had hurt my feelings, and smiled regardless of being embarrassed that I was there. I'm a lucky mom. I have great kids, I really do. It's just sad that soon I'm going to have to deal with my little ones being not so little...and not as kind, and not as sweet...cause that just happens. And I realized I'm just not ready. At all. Maybe I'll luck out and they'll be sweeter than most, but they are my kids, and if what goes around comes around, I'm not looking forward to what's coming around. Luckily, however, they're Jeff's children, too. So that might mean that all hope isn't lost.
On a lighter note, I've been enjoying my time with Syd each day. She just keeps getting more and more fun. She's a dancing machine and now officially has 7 teeth. They've come through, they just need to come down. This discovery makes our last couple of weeks a lot less scary, as she'd been really clingy and crabby.
Jeff was going through some of our old stuff the other day, and found a costume that Muffy bought for Riley when she was born. Because Syd is so big, we had to basically stuff her in it, but she looked SO cute, and it reminded me of when Riley was a baby. Yet another reason to be sad about my babies constantly growing up. So I'm just going to enjoy them...I guess that's all I can do. Just be happy that each day they're here with me, and they're making me smile and wish I could take notes on all the funny things they say and do in a day. (Look familiar, Muff?)
Hope you all are doing well, and enjoying life. It's for sure sometimes we have to just stop going so quickly, slow down, and be grateful for what we have. When I actually do this, I always find that that's when I'm happiest.