A day full of firsts...

Yesterday was Grace's first day of preschool. I took her up to the school and dropped her off and then she came home on the bus (actually it's a van). She started to cry when she realized that I wasn't staying with her and I could hear her crying "MOMMY!" as I drove away. I considered going back to give her a hug and a kiss since I kind of had snuck away unseen but thought that would just make it worse. The teacher's note said that she cried for the first hour but then when they started to paint, she stopped crying and joined in. She said they also played in the gym after that and she loved that too. Very typical Grace though. She just needed something interesting enough to take her mind off the tears. After 30 minutes, she probably didn't even remember what she was crying about, but that she was crying about something so she should continue.

So starting on Monday, she will take the van to and from school. When she came home yesterday she was so proud to come home on the bus. Today when we got to school, her van was outside the school waiting for the teachers to come out and get the kids off so we opened the door and she climbed right in to her carseat there. She is already making it her own.

As for Lucas, he has cried both days when we left his sister at school. He was a little lost when we got home and she wasn't there to torture by following her around the house but he soon found something to do on his own. He is sooo in love with books lately. He will find one that he wants to read and either curl up in this chair with it or bring it to me and say "Buh buh buh". His Daddy is big on early literacy skills....

Yesterday was also Gracie's first day of dance class, with a new teacher (different from last year's because we had to move to evening classes due to pre-school). Her class started at 5:30 and at 4:00 I decided that she needed a really cute bag to tote her dance shoes to class with her in. Luckily I found these cute scraps of fabric in my stuff so I could make a cute one. I was rushed for time as I still had to get her dressed for dance, plus fed some dinner (including Lucas and myself). I think the bag turned out pretty darn cute for no measuring, very little pinning, having 2 kids in my lap and just making it all up as I went. I only had to unpick one thing...I sewed the straps on wrong but it was easily corrected.

The dancing story doesn't end as happily as the pre-school. She didn't want to participate (although I think it was hard for her to hear with all the other tap shoes tapping). I'm going to have to try a special program on her implant next week and see if it helps. The dance people have agreed to put in an audio system in the dance room for her (which was supposed to be in by this fall but it didn't work out like that) and as far as I know there is not a set time that it will happen yet. I am hoping for her teacher's sake that it will happen quickly. I am hoping that it will work out because she is in a show class this year (yikes!) which means that she is getting a costume and supposed to be in the recital in December and May. I really think she's capable of doing it but she has to be interested in it.....we'll just see what happens!