First Day Of School!

School started on Monday, August 25th this year.

Alison is in 6th grade - the top of the totem pole at Creekside Elementary.  She's going to have a great year!  Her teacher, Mr. Hardy is new to this school, but not to teaching.  He seems like a really fun, laid back man.  Alison likes him already.  In 6th grade, you rotate to different teachers for different subjects.  Ali will get to work with all of the teachers.  Her science teacher has one of 19 classrooms in the whole country that is a NASA partner classroom.  It looks pretty cool!

I already miss Alison around here.  She's a huge help with the baby and a fun friend to have around.

Nicole is in 4th grade.  Don't you love her bangs?  Her teacher is also brand new to the school, but not to teaching.  She's been teaching for decades!  Nicki's classroom is in a portable.  I'm not too excited about it (temperature wise, and also security wise) but Nicki thinks it's neat.  One of her neighborhood friends is in her class, so that will be fun.  In 4th grade, they split up the kids for math and rotate them to different teachers based on skill level. Nicole is in the highest level group.  Hooray for girls that are smart at math!!!

The young neighborhood kids (and their moms too, I'm sure) miss Nicki! They knock on our door almost every day and ask if Nicki can play.

Joshua started kindergarten!  What a big boy!!!  Literally.  He's huge!  He's already tall for his age, plus he's one of the oldest kids in his class, so he's roughly twice the size of all of his classmates!

Our neighbor, Kaja, is in Josh's class.  So weird!  Josh plays with her older brother at home!

Josh goes to the morning session of kindergarten.  On the first day, the parents went with them.  It was fun to see all our neighbors.  Four or five kids from our ward are all in the same class - of course, they're a year younger than Josh in primary.  Anyway, the kids went to the library to watch a movie while the parents had an orientation meeting.  I let Bron go with the big kids.  He had a blast!  He wants to go to kindergarten too!

Meanwhile, in my meeting I discovered that I'd dropped the ball on Josh's immunizations.  He would "not be let back in the school" until they were caught up - mmm hmm,  So that afternoon, we made an impromptu visit to the doctor's office for a check up.  We discovered several things:
1 - Josh has EXCELLENT vision.  What a relief!  Here's hoping all my kids inherit my eyesight, not David's!
2 - He's so far off the growth curve that it's freaky.  He's the size of an average nine year old.
3 - Shots don't hurt too bad.  Finger sticks to draw blood do.

Bronson sure misses his big brother!  I try to do something "preschool-y" with him while Josh is gone.

We are looking forward to a great school year!  It is the last year that all my kids will be in the same school.  I'd better enjoy it while I can.  Oh, and on a side note, August 25th was not only the first day of school, it was also National Banana Split Day.  Just in case you needed a reason to party!