Today was Elias’ first day of school for the year. This year he’ll be attending Pre-K at Prince of Peace Preschool. It’s the same school he was at last year. This year he’ll attend four days a week for three and a half hours each day. His new teacher is Mrs. Bernick.
Last night he was having night before jitters. He came down a while after we had put him to bed and said he was having bad dreams about his new class. He hadn’t actually been asleep yet (I’m fairly certain) so I think he was just laying in bed worrying. Poor little guy! I talked to him a bit and cuddled him until he was calm.
This morning Elias was excited to go to school despite the anxiety he had had the night before. Here he is proudly holding his school bag. I had wanted him to hold one of those “First Day of….” signs that are so popular for the picture, but he insisted he wanted to hold his school bag. Who am I to argue?
Of course, Simon wanted in on the pictures. He wants to go to school, but he won’t start until next September. Look at the little goof ball trying to steal the show.
When we got to school, Elias found his seat and proudly showed his “homework” to his teacher. Then she said they were going to start out by playing and Elias ran over to the blocks to begin building.
Mrs. Bernick kindly said that parents were allowed to stay for ten minutes and then needed to leave. Elias got a little watery eyed when I said I was leaving, but there were no actual tears.
When I picked up Elias he said it was a lot of fun and his friends were even nicer. I think he had a great first day!
That wasn’t the end of Elias’ day, though! We went straight to a lunch play date and then came home for nap time and quiet time. Then Elias had his first swimming lesson of the new session, and his first night of AWANA!
What a day! I’m proud of my little guy.
Elias has grown so much in self confidence in the last year -it’s really apparent in the last few months. I love watching him pass the peace in church recently all up and down the aisle greeting lots of different folks! And the fact that he could come down, use words to let you know he was anxious… wow!