Mommy New Year

Yesterday was what Sam has dubbed "Mommy New Year." The house was as quiet as I had hoped and I remembered what it was like to think a complete thought. I thoroughly enjoyed my day. Thoroughly. Even as I type right now I am amazed at how quiet the house is and how radically different it looks and sounds when the kid tornado hits at 3:00.

Emily started high school yesterday. We went on Tuesday night to meet her teachers and I am telling you that campus is HUGE. Oh, and the kids are HUGE. My little 14 year old will be walking the halls with huge 18 year old football players. Not to mention that weird guy we saw with the spiked mohawk wearing a kilt. Seriously. A kilt. I'm sure he hangs out with the football players and cheerleaders on weekends. Right. High school hasn't changed much since we were there. Except for that kilt--no one in my high school wore a kilt.

Em had a good day and was able to find her classes with ease thereby escaping every freshman's nightmare of getting lost. She had a hard time finding her bus at the end of the day and had to run to it in the nasty heat, but that was the extent of the hardship. I'm looking forward to hearing how day 2 went since she didn't have the first day nervousness to deal with. She already had homework last night and tomorrow she has a test in English. Day 3 and a test. Very unlike the other kids at the elementary school who were spending the first day being indoctrinated with the classroom rules and did getting to know you activities all day. Katya heard about one of the other 6th grade classes who had to do math and language and stuff. You know--work! Clearly that teacher didn't get the memo. Katya was horrified for her friends in that class.

So, here is the breakdown: Katya is in 6th grade--her final year in elementary before heading off to the junior high. Noah is in 5th grade and has Katya's teacher from last year--which is nice for us to not have to get to know someone new. Rachel is in 4th grade and has Noah's teacher from last year. This is actually proving to be a bit confusing for me because I am used to Mrs. B's stuff being for Katya and Ms. J's stuff being for Noah, but now Mrs. B's stuff is for Noah and Ms. J's stuff is for Rachel. I have enough trouble keeping track of things without added confusion. I'm sure there will be more than one time when I send the wrong kid with the wrong paper. They'll have to get over it. Anyhoo, Tommy is now in 2nd grade with a teacher we have never had before. I don't think anyone has prepped her for the Tommy experience, but she has 20 years of teaching under her belt and she should be able to handle him. Theoretically. The good news is that his first grade teacher misses him--seriously. So, he's a tough one to handle, but his personality and the cuteness factor clearly make up for that. Of course the passage of time helps too.

Tommy's class is in a portable building this year because the school has grown so much. His teacher likes to refer to them as the "chalets"--which I think has a nice ring to it, as compared to the "double wide trailer trash out back." This means the long walk to the bathroom (which is inside the building) is going to be frought with temptations for him to be distracted by the children who are on the playground. None of his cohorts from last year are in his class this year though so that is very good news. He told me the story of a boy at his table yesterday who was hiding one of the girl's nametags. The teacher had to ask him THREE times to give it back (Tommy delivered that news with much horror--3 times!). My response was this: DO NOT become friends with that boy!!!! Stay away from him!!!! Tommy always seems to be able to find the one kid in class that is a bad influence on him and then we (and his teacher) end up telling him he can't sit with him at lunch or sit by him in class or look at him, etc. I'm hoping this year is different. Hey, a girl can hope!

So, now I'm off to pick up my little darlings and to witness the force of the kid tornado (level 5). And then we are off to a DBacks game tonight with our friends the C's. Yahoo!