School week in review

I don't have any fun pictures, but I thought I'd record a post summarizing the first week of school.  Emily really enjoyed her first week and was excited to go back each day.  She still hasn't needed her alarm clock as she has come down the stairs fully dressed by 6:45am every day.  She also still hasn't slept under the covers. ;o)

Emily definitely prefers riding in the van to walking to school, although we have tried to walk at least one way each day.  It is quite a hike either uphill or downhill.  It is also along and across some very busy roads.  It will be quite awhile before I would trust her on her own.

By Thursday, Emily seemed to be more settled in, less tired/grouchy after school and much more talkative.  We still haven't heard a whole lot about things they have done in the actual classroom.  We have, however, heard every detail of how lunch period works.  Lunch and recess are her favorite things, although she claims Monday will be her favorite day when they get to check books out of the library and go to the computer lab.

Emily is being a great sport about trying school lunch even though she doesn't care for some of the food.  Once we cycle through everything we'll start thinking about packing a lunch.  We try to start out the day with a large breakfast that includes something hot like oatmeal or scrambled eggs.  I'm thankful they have a milk break with crackers in the morning and a "fruit break" with a healthy snack you pack yourself in the afternoon.  She's usually still pretty hungry after school!

Emily already seems to know the names of most of the kids in her class (I think they have spent a lot of time learning them and getting to know each other).  I also already know the names of the kids who are probably going to be the chronic troublemakers.  Her teacher uses a stoplight as a classroom management strategy.  Emily told me she always raises her hand politely and tries to be quiet as a mouse so she will never move off green. :o)

Lincoln & I also had a great week.  After an exhausting day running around on Tuesday, we had a more relaxed rest of the week.  Lincoln spent a lot of uninterrupted time playing with trains (we moved the train table upstairs) and all kinds of toys out of the toy closet.  We went on an 8-mile bike ride one morning through the tunnels on the Waverly Rail Trail with a stop at Fareway on the way home.  He also spent some quality time sitting in the sandbox.  I felt like I accomplished a lot, including some yummy baking, and am somewhat back on top of things within the household and on the computer.  I have a lot more I'd like to catch up on, though, including the blog!  (This is part of another 10+ post run, so click on "older posts" to catch them all.)

I'll end with a video of how Lincoln spent a good deal of Friday morning without his sister around to boss him or run the show--except the last clip which was after school and Emily shares a trivia fact from the book she had just checked out of the public library.  :o)