Mantooth Family: First Grade, Big Kid and Cots

Porter has enjoyed her first week of first grade...well...except the part where she apparently picked up a bug and came home early today with a 100.9 degree fever. She's fascinated with the desk fairy who comes at night and inspects the order of their desks and rewards prizes to those who have complied with her teacher's instructions on upkeep. She also enjoys the idea of homework...the kind she does voluntary that doesn't even have to go back. I suppose that's the best kind and suspect that it's when it IS required that it loses its allure.

Betsy is the big kid at daycare and has embraced that role but has truly struggled this week being the middle Mantooth. She longs to go to kindergarten or first grade and to ride the bus. (Look at the picture below. The longing look in her eyes isn't for her sister, it's for the bus!) But ever my positive perspective child, she announced this morning on the way to daycare (in our less than glamorous tan minivan) that we were going to school in a CAR BUS. I jumped on board, and within minutes we had found happiness in our bus that came equipped with praise songs and choir CD's (something I ensured her that Porter's public school bus did not have) and we went to Betsy School, which for any self-centered four-year-old is more than cool. (Of course, if she declared upon arriving that daycare had indeed been renamed...well, that was a problem for them to deal with. I will gladly take royalties should they change the name of the school for recruiting purposes.)

Jack...the one leaving his identity as "the baby" at lightening speed...moved to a room with cots this week. With each child I have cringed at the thought of the transition from baby bed to cot at daycare. It's not so much for fear of my child's well being as it is my fear of the teachers losing their sanity. Really...what mother do you know who can get 8+, 16 - 18-month-olds to sleep on cots (able to freely roam) all at the same time?! I can't get two "big kids" to stay in bed! The trick is that this occurs as they are transitioning from two naps to one, and they finally get to have a regular time on the playground in the morning. So...the magic is that they exhaust them.

With that said, exhaustion is probably the underlying theme for the week. While Monday and Tuesday mornings went smoothly with everyone on the "high" of newness...Wednesday came with a dark cloud. Poor Jamie was so proud of Porter who was getting up with her (requested) alarm clock at 5:50 a.m. with no prompting...for two days. She stumbled out of her room on Wed and couldn't get it to turn off. Her attitude for the rest of the morning was less than flattering...and we'll just skip making a permanent, written play-by-play of that experience. By Thursday morning she had figured out the art of turning the alarm off and going back to bed. A child after my own heart!! Betsy, on the other hand, has emerged the past two mornings saying, "I told Porter to get up. Her alarm went off." So...perhaps we have at least one "morning person" child.

This is Porter explaining the process of boarding the bus to Betsy...something she had never done before nor had she been coached on, but she certainly had an opinion about it!