First Day of School . . . .

Well, not really her first day of school, but her first day of day care.  Since I start back to work in two weeks, we are transitioning Anne Louise into day care so it won’t be so traumatic for her (I mean, me).  Today went as well as could be expected.  It took me 45 minutes to leave, I cried twice, and I called Patrick as soon as I got in the car asking him if we were making a mistake.  We’ve been on the waitlist to get in this place since the week we found out I was pregnant, and I have been really looking forward to going back to work (its my dream job; I work with great people; and I’m going a little stir-crazy in our 1600 square foot “ranch”).  Plus, this place is literally 100 yards from the door of Judge Whitney’s chambers, so as far as options go, this was my FIRST CHOICE by a mile.  But today was definitely hard, notwithstanding everyone’s efforts to make things ok.  Anne Louise was super bubbly and talkative this morning on the ride there – lots of laughing, which is adorable.  When we got there, I took her in her room (“Infant Two”) where they had everything already set up for her (name on her cubby, folder in the notebook, name on the crib).  The first little one to walk up to Anne Louise was a little boy named Sam (which I took as a good sign since that’s my dad’s name!).  Sam was all about greeting Anne Louise.  He touched her feet, tried to rock her car seat, and followed us around the whole time!  When I told Patrick about all the attention Sam was giving Anne Louise, the first thing he said was “what church do his parents go to?”  Sounds just like my dad . . . .

With some help from AL’s teacher Raven, I got her cubby packed full of diapers, corrected my labels on the bottles and put them in the fridge (they have like 800 labels on them), and showed Anne Louise around the room.  One of the coolest things I saw was in the other infant room – they were fingerpainting!  I couldn’t believe that little kids could play with things like that, but they had them stripped down to the diapers and some of the kids were covered in paint.  It was adorable.  Lots of teachers on hand to assist obviously, but I was VERY impressed at how they were occupying their time.  Anyway, based on our normal schedule, it was technically her naptime, so I put her in her crib, kissed her goodbye, and went to the office to fill out our paperwork.  I totally lost it in the middle of turning in all the forms because I heard AL crying, but managed to get it together.  I decided to go back in one more time to say goodbye, thinking Anne Louise would be in tears, but she was smiley as Raven held her.  Apparently, the crying was because of a dirty diaper, NOT because she hated to see me go.  

After another meltdown (from me, not Anne Louise), I managed to get out of the building.  I came home to clean the house (which amazingly took 1/4th of the time since AL wasn’t here) and decided to back to get her after only a few hours.  The cars on the way there couldn’t get out of my way fast enough!  I was so excited, you’d think I was on my way to collect a million dollars.  As soon as I got there, I saw Anne Louise’s picture on the door, and Raven greeted me with Anne Louise.  She and the other teacher Sherry had written me a special note saying how well Anne Louise had done and how they promised to take good care of her.  Raven showed me the picture on the door that she had taken, gave me the rundown on Anne Louise’s napping and eating (she stayed right on schedule), and showed me Anne Louise’s daily “report card” that tracked all that had happened during the day.  Anne Louise’s favorite toy today was the infant mobile (surprise, surprise – they are, after all, her “friends” as Caroline calls it).  I was so excited to hold Anne Louise and was thrilled to get such a great report on her first day!  Hopefully, Anne Louise (and I) will get some more “adjusting” time this week . . . . I think I need it more than her!