First day of school!

Sweetie, the first grader

Mister, the third grader

H, the tag-along

The first-day-of-school cake and cupcakes. (The cupcakes have chocolate-dipped pretzel crayons with printables from here and airhead books, idea from here.)

H, with rashes from (I'm guessing) the egg-full batter of the first-day-of-school cake and cupcakes.

We walked the kids to their classrooms this morning, with sweat rolling down our backs and with arms full of a load of school supplies. Mister is usually the one who is nervous about any change, the one who has trouble sleeping days before a new event. But this morning he was very nonchalant about the whole first-day-of-school thing. No second hugs (in fact, he probably barely tolerated the first hug), no smiling for the camera. He went into his classroom and got to business unloading his stuff. No big deal.

Sweetie, on the other hand, has been up at night, scared for the first day. This morning she barely touched her pancake and eggs and would hardly crack a smile for the camera. Last year she could hardly wait for her turn to start school, for eating in the lunchroom, and riding the bus. Maybe this year she knows it's not all fun and games?

After school, though, she was bubbling with details about her class nickles and the music performance this year. Her only complaint about first grade is that there's only 2 recesses instead of the 4 that they have in kindergarten. Mister had plenty of complaints about third grade, though, some of them related to his teacher and others related to schedule (no lunch until 1:05?! That's a long time for my skinny boy to wait to eat!). He told me tonight that he wants to go back to second grade.

As for me, there are times that I wouldn't mind going back in time too. I really can't believe that Mister is already in third grade. It seems like just a blink of an eye ago that he started school. Milestones like today are good for shaking me up a bit and helping me realize how blessed I am to be able to love these people for eternity.