From Soccer Mom to Lunch Lady

Ok, it's not all about me... in fact, it's actually all about Emma's becoming a big kindergartner. She was pretty anxious before her first day, saying she didn't want to go, etc. As we were walking in, she announced she was going to walk in like a big girl. I asked if this meant not holding my hand, and she specified "like a big girl holding your hand." After I took her to the classroom, the bell rang, and I waited outside the door with a few other parents while the kids said the pledge of allegiance and had their very politically correct moment of silence. Emma had this look on her face of "I'm not totally sure about this..." when I waved goodbye. All summer long, I've looked forward to getting my life back, but it didn't surprise me when I went home that morning and cried. Kent and I reminisced about how fast our girl has grown and said a prayer for her. I have a feeling that, as parents, we would do well to make friends with that bittersweet mix of pride and letting go.

She had a good first day. By day 2 or 3 she was pushing me out in the mornings "go, Mom!!" (smiling) and asking how many more days until first grade. One of the side benefits of her being in Miss Robinson's class is sometimes at home she just goes crazy with "yes Ma'am, thank you Ma'am"s, and has discovered what an instant antidote to grow-up grumpiness that can be and how it increases the chances of her getting whatever she wants dramatically.

After experiencing life at a cooperative preschool, where I got so familiar with each classroom, where things were kept and how the teacher liked things done, as well as relating to and disciplining other people's kids and vice versa, I wanted to ward off feelings of being an outsider to this new world of Emma's, so I signed up to volunteer once a month in the school cafeteria as a cashier. Yesterday was my first shift. Emma gave me a big hug and I learned that, according to Highland Park ISD, anyway, tater tots are a vegetable (?!?). So now, I'm even sexier than a soccer mom; I'm a soccer mom AND lunch lady!! (No hair net, thankfully.) It was pretty fun.

Here are some photos from Emma's first week at school, including one with her teacher, Miss Robinson, and one with Emma and her special two-toned jello and home-made white chocolate chip cookies as part of her happy first-day of school dinner. She planned the menu: spaghetti with meatballs and broccoli with cheese sauce and, of course, a special fancy surprise dessert. (Her latest favorite word is flabbergasted. She enjoys the looks of flabbergastery on people's faces when she shows them she knows what it means. My latest favorite word, meanwhile, is flabbergastery.)

Pure, Unadulterated Parental Pride

Emma scored a private lesson w/ her swim teacher, Mr. Hal today since the other two girls didn't show. They had a really good lesson! Hal called me in after it was over & coached Emma in showing off what they'd been working on. She really is confident now in the crawl and easily goes from one side of the pool to the other. They're working on breathing now with that. She can also flip over in the middle of that to her back, do a sort of backstroke on her own and flip back over--its' awesome! AND she can do an amazing push off from the wall. He said she's really learned amazingly quickly this summer, which just confirmed what I'd been thinking, too, given that at the beginning of the summer, it always felt to me like she was within an inch of her life in the water. Anyway, we're now the proud parents of a Giggle Duck (after only 5 wks. of lessons)!!

Could Be Worse, Ch. 349

What a horrible night! Emma woke up twice and between that and my being such a poor sleeper, I hardly got any. We just got home from a marathon run to Target to look for, among other things, a night light (apparently the reports linking them to myopia in 1999 were flawed). We walked in and she said something cheery and I said something like "it's been kind of a difficult day, thanks for being such a good sport" and she said cheerily "It's not as bad as the Knights of the Table Round being stuck in a pit with snakes!" (We'd just read about Sir Gawaine's imprisonment in the Dolorous Tower and I'd said something at the time about how we can think of that when we start feeling sorry for ourselves. Hot damn--they do listen!) I just broke out laughing and she couldn't understand why I would express such joviality at Sir Gawaine's misfortune.

NFS

Overheard today:

Emma [some stinky comment]
Kent: "Come, here... let me smack your bottom" (kidding, of course)
Emma: "My bottom is not for sale."

It's amazing how many opportunities since then we've found to say "My bottom [insert age-appropriate synonym, depending on who is in the room] is not for sale."

Everybody Into the Pool

Emma had been a bit behind the curve on her swimming, very hesitant to put her face in the water and requiring various types of inflatable Things as well a me close by when in the water. I couldn't seem to get her ready to put arms and legs together. Not only was this not a lot of fun for me, but I had so much fun in the water when I was a kid, I wanted Emma to be able to experience that, too, if she could instead of being tied to the edge or shallow end when her friends were jumping and diving. So when the opportunity arose for her to take a swimming class with a friend, I signed her up.

The teachers seemed particularly great with dealing with beginning swimmers and their anxieties (unlike Kent's teachers with their sink or swim philosophy, pretty scary for a kid with as little body fat as Kent!) Emma enjoyed watching the sample class but basically said no way was she getting in that pool with those strange people. When the day of the first class arrived, I told Emma all she needed to do was to get in the pool with her bathing suit on and we could go to Kohl's and get the $5 BarbiePrincessFashionWhatever with the microscopic shoes she'd been talking about for two weeks straight. After that, if she really didn't want to take the class, she didn't have to. She did fine that first day. Only cried once (when she saw me--how awful a feeling is that?!). She could hardly wipe the smile off her face during the second class. When she woke up in the morning of day #3, she said out of the blue "Mommy? I LOVE swimming class!". At the next pool party, she really enjoyed seeing how much she could do on her own or with just a little help from me, including swimming using the kickboard. I always get a report when she's put her face under water and opened her eyes and it "didn't hurt at all". Having successfully navigated how hard to push her to get her past her fears and into a fun, confident place, given the right environment, I felt exhilarated. Emma and I talked about it in terms of how the mommy bird knows when her babies are ready to fly and how they each feel when it's time. They say we need to give our kids roots and wings, and I'm sure I'm only beginning to understand why everyone is so sure the roots are the easy part. Here's a photo of Emma and her favorite teacher, (Mr.) Hal.

Swearing Off Colonel Sanders

I just started my summer job: teaching a video production class at an elementary school summer arts camp. Doing anything creative with kids is tons of fun, but it's left me pretty pooped by the end of the day with Emma on the days I teach. But I've made a crucial discovery: as long as Emma wants to play surgeon, I can lie down when I'm the patient. Today, I came to Doctor Lisa with stomach pains, so she performed surgery on me. I was more than a little surprised to learn postoperatively that my pain was due to some foreign items in my stomach, namely: a hairball, a chicken bone, and two fat chicken legs. (Next time, I'll just get me some hairball medicine.)

A Day of Firsts

Emma lost her very first tooth today!!! (And Mom shot her very first wedding!) We left the tooth in an envelope under her pillow along with some questions for the tooth fairy. "How old are you Miss or Mr. Tooth Fairy? Are you a boy or a girl? Are you real or pretend? What do you wear? Is there more than one Tooth Fairy?" (I added the last one. I'd really like to know.).... Later: it looks as if the tooth fairy has answered all of Emma's questions, but not in order. The tooth has been removed from the envelope and several slips of paper have been left in its place, fortune-cookie-style, to whit: "older than the oldest tooth", "I am woman, hear me flutter!" "What do you think?", "I wear wings", and "Is there more than one Emma?".