Back to School

As I'm sitting here with my kids around because it's already potato harvest, I realized I still haven't written about school starting. This year was a little different start to school.  For the first time ever, Cheyenne wasn't ready to go back to school. I guess she had a fun summer.  Billy was a little nervous about his teacher (thanks big sisters who didn't say anything good about his teacher, even though they never had her.)  Chloe, Maddie, and Jon couldn't wait to get to school and I really wasn't sure I was ready for them to go.  But the first day came anyway.  Cheyenne had friends in all her classes, so that was good, however she makes friends so quickly and easily it doesn't really matter.  The funniest thing is I had 3 of her 5 teachers and one other was teaching when I was there, I just never had him.  She also started seminary this year, which she was a little unsure of (church in the middle of every day) but has now found she really likes it. 
Natalie has a different group of friends in all her classes this year and that's kind of fun for her.  She has one teacher who plays 80's music everyday and she's quite proud of herself for knowing almost every song she's played. She has one teacher who's a little annoying, according to Natalie, with her creative learning ideas, and that's about all I hear about school. Trying to get Natalie to tell me anything about school is like pulling teeth.  That's my challenge with her this year. :)
As I said, Billy was a little nervous about his teacher this year, and after last year's mess, I was, too.  I was really hoping for a great teacher who would be kind and loving, not like last year's and that's what we got.  Billy came home the first day with a smile and said she was a great teacher. YES!  He also has some good friends in his class, again, not like last year.  He's really enjoying school, especially reading.

 Then there's Chloe, Maddie, and Jon.  They're in afternoon kindergarten, which means 11:45 to 2:20, a quick couple of hours.  They couldn't wait to get there, I on the other hand was leaving my babies.  Yup, I cried, but not until I got to the car.  That first few days was a little weird, it is so quiet with everyone gone.  I wasn't quite sure what to do with myself.  However, that only lasted a few days and now I love my two hours by myself.  It's two hours that I cram everything I possibly can into, errand running, cleaning, crafting, reading, visiting teaching, temple sessions, it's hard to narrow down what I'm going to squeeze into that time each day.  But back to the three, they LOVE school.  Their teacher is wonderful and three other kids from our ward are in their class, too.  In fact, since we have to drive them to school this year, we carpool with two of them.  They're learning a ton and will be reading before we know it.  I also get to help in their class on Thursday's, which is pretty fun for me.

So now it's back to the homework/practicing/chores balancing game after school.  Sitting with 4 kids to do homework with 20 minutes of reading/being read to, each night, trying to help Cheyenne with geometry (ha, ha), making sure everyone gets their piano practicing done, it all gets very interesting at times, but it's all good.