As I mentioned in my last post, my oldest child will be starting kindergarten in a couple weeks. Being new to the ‘school’ thing, I have been amazed by the amount of paperwork, forms, doctor’s appointments, etc. Who knew you had to make the ‘back to school’ appointment months in advance? Not me!!
The other day, we received an adorable ‘Countdown to Kindergarten’ calendar from the school district. After carefully reading the directions on the back, I learned we had to begin opening the ‘windows’ 14 days before school is to begin. Each ‘window’ was to give the child a new task to prepare for school. Not being the quickest with math, I opened my iphone calendar and counted to 14 backwards in a very sad attempt to know what day to start my son’s first school assignment. We eagerly awaited the day to arrive.
Day one my son carefully peeled open the flap and I read the directions. He was to draw a picture of his family and bring it with him to school. This turned into a great activity for all three of my children. As I placed his finished masterpiece on a magnet next to the calendar, I wondered if we were really supposed to send it with him to his first day of school. Not wanting to be pegged as the ‘slacker mom’ on the first day of school, I made a mental note to shove it in his backpack just in case.
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Day two we opened the calendar and it was a friendly reminder to plan a healthy breakfast for the first day of school. After much discussion, we decided on waffles. I wondered if the sugar-high from the syrup would be a bit much but then remembered, it would have long passed once I picked him up at noon.
Day three, my son once again flipped open the window and asked me what the ‘message from his teacher’ said this time. There was a picture of a clock and my son was to draw the hands of the clock to read what time he was supposed to start school. As I dug through packet upon packet looking for the right answer, it dawned on me that my son can’t tell time, nor can he draw the hands on a clock. Geez, didn’t we learn that sometime in 6th grade? I was starting to realize this calendar was not only preparing my son for his first day but his family as well.
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Anyway, I finally found the time and carefully drew the hour and minute hands to display when he should arrive at school. The packet said school began at 8:55 in the morning. Later that day, my son came up the driveway with the mail. Low and behold, there was a postcard from school stating the name of his teacher and the time to arrive at school…8:50am! My first thought of course was that I needed to keep this postcard for his baby book and my next thought was ‘my’ assignment from the calendar. Hmmmmm, 5 minutes is a big difference when you are trying to get your child to school on time. I quickly switched the clock to the earlier time, talk about being pegged as a ‘slacker mom’ the first day of school.
Looking forward to seeing what MY next activity is tomorrow. Judging from the shirt and pants on the ‘window’ I assume it has something to do with school clothes shopping….something I have not done since I was on the ‘receiving’ end of the deal.
