Well, the daycare gods are smiling on me because a little while after I wrote about the daycare/kindergarten stresses, Will got a spot in the daycare that is attached to the school where his kindergarten is. It’s about 3 blocks from our house. Heaven. But I’ll tell you – the offer was met with tears from me.
In August 2009, I dropped Will off for his first day. We were loaded with a box of diapers, his lunch, two snacks, a sippy cup of milk and his blankie. He looked a little something like this…
He drooled, was a horrible napper, didn’t sleep through the night, couldn’t talk, wouldn’t drink from anything but his mom.
He didn’t shed a tear when I left him the first day and I bawled the whole way to work.
We were blessed that he found Flora on his first day and Flora found him. They were inseparable. And Flora saved us. I’m not sure how many days in those first few months when I would drop him off and she would take one look at me and hug me. And I would sob for a minute. She would tell me over and over again what a good boy he was, how smart, how beautiful and how much easier I would find it a few months down the line. She was so right. As things DID get easier, she would wink at me and say – you see I told you mommy – I told you.
Yesterday Will said good-bye to Flora – She smothered him with hugs and kisses. Then we hugged and cried some more. I vowed to keep in touch because she wants to know what he will become! (so do I!!)
We made our rounds and said good-bye to all his old teachers and the LOVE. The love was overwhelming. We were so blessed to have his first few years at this daycare. So much of Will and his awesomeness has come from these women. They indulged his love of books, danced with him to the Wiggles and enveloped him in love. They let me go to work every day knowing what a blast he was having.
After our good-bye rounds, his class shared cheesies and cake….and then they all got a chance to say/yell BYE WILL – WE’LL MISS YOU. (I didn’t get a picture of me silently weeping in the corner…honest to god – it’s just pms!)
He hugged his two best girls good-bye….
And then his class gave us this good-bye poster – which now hangs in our playroom.
It’s over two and a half years later. The boy talks non-stop, only drools to piss me off, sleeps through the night, pees on the potty…and yes, still needs his blankie.
Today, we started at our new school. Will walked to school with his friend Grace. Yes – we WALKED to school. The backpack? A first day surprise from his mom…his old backpack with patches of Princesses on it. (Want to know where to get them? Cut them out of undies that you get at Walmart…free pencil case too!)
It’s a new start and I’m excited for him!!! For both of us.
speaking as a former childcare worker who has been on the other side of the tears – I can tell you wholeheartedly that I love – LOVE – seeing my former charges and how they’ve grown. Yes – it makes me feel super old, but remembering back to when they were wee tods in diapers and seeing them entering highshool, graduating…it’s amazing! It also makes me realize that my kids are growing far too fast for my liking.
So glad for you Sara that you have found Will a good place close to home and that is a great long term fit!
awww Jen…..now I’m sniffing too for you….
Our family was blessed to have an amazing daycare at my work. My kids each spent years 1-4 at the daycare until they graduated to the local school for kindergarten. The daycare staff were such an amazing support, resource, sounding board and supplement to our family. I still run into staff on campus every now and then, and they inevitably ask about all family members each time. They want to see pictures of little Liam who came to them as a sweet cherubic one year old and is now almost 13 and towers over their mother. They want to hear that Connor, who was so shy he had his brother speak for him was recently voted “funniest boy in class”. They want to see photos of little Rylan who came to them when she had just learned to walk, and is now a hip hop and soccer superstar. I still don’t know what I would have done without that daycare and I’m welling up just thinking about how fortunate we were.
I am lucky that the daycare my Missy is in is located in a school & she is allowed to attend that school even though we are out of area. The hard thing is going to be when she is done SK, we will HAVE to move her to the school in our area and she will also leave all her friends. (Not that there are many left….most have moved away…I think she is the last one of her original “bunch” & that makes me sad). My family moved around a lot when I was a child because of my Dad’s job, so I’m trying my hardest to not move her around, if I can help it.
He has gotten so big (I’ve watched him grow through your posts) and I’m sure he will do wonderfully at the new place too.
I truly believe all of this is MUCH harder on us as parents then the ones we are trying to protect.
Hugs!
wow, what a fella! i hope this new transition wasn’t too hard on him…and you! it must be hard to say good bye to such a great relationship. glad to hear you’ll still visit!
This is SO great, Sara!! Wow. I’m so happy the new place is so much closer to your house – that rocks! But it’s so sad to say goodbye. Yay for Will for being so well adjusted!
We’ll be saying goodbye to our awesome preschool at the end of the year. And almost as bad as saying goodbye to a place where both kids have gone for the last six years, the new place is FURTHER away. I’m already sick about it. Grrrr…
And GOSH I love that boy’s tie… *swoons*