So....a little update on first grade, now that we're a month in!
Quinn is absolutely in love with first grade. She wakes up filled with joy in the mornings and can't wait to get there! She and I have begun a nice rhythm of spending about 15 minutes cuddled on the couch watching the sun light up the sky and reading some Bible stories together. And you should be proud of me--I have not pushed my snooze button one time this school year, making it a big priority to get up in time to be with Q a bit. I am NOT a morning person, so this is a big deal for me. Thankful God put it on my heart to carve out a little niche for her in the mornings because we both cherish it.
We have about a 30 minute drive to her school. I do not love that. I hate being in the car. Thankfully we have some pretty parts on our drive, so that makes it less painful. Quinn calls Oma every morning on our drive and chats with her a bit.
Beck rushes to open this gate for us every day, then ride on it as it swings closed. We have lots of little routines with our crew!
We often take some snapchats before school to send to our snapfans! Okay, mostly Oma and Opa, who keep up with these crazies that way. We park near a big grassy field where the sun comes up through the trees. You can almost always see sunbeams dancing through the branches and you know that just thrills this nature-lovin' Mama. Beck knows this, so he always points it out to me. :)
She takes her lunch every day. With no egg-containing substances or tree nuts of any kind. Yikes, hard to keep this girl in protein without eggs and nuts.
Her classroom......
We still take flowers from our yard several times a week. And I drink my coffee on the way to school. That also makes my drive less painful! I also try to write a note to her teacher at least once a week with something Q or I appreciate about her.....when I was in the classroom I usually only got notes that were complaining about something I did, so I try to write positive ones often and set that example for Quinn. We also spent some time writing a note to her teacher from last year, thanking her for the ways she prepared Q to be so successful in first grade. We're spending a lot of time working on gratitude with Quinn this year...I think that is a character trait that first graders can finally begin to grasp and we want to be intentional about helping this become part of Quinn's nature.
She usually tries to talk him into carrying her bag. Somehow her backpack has gone into hiding this year. We still have not found that thing, and I know it has got to be in the house. So in the meantime she has a little tote for her school bag.
They start out their day playing. Q always does the monkeybars first thing. That is her in the pink, swinging across, in true first-grader fashion! I remember my first grade girls always had blisters and calluses on their hands the first few weeks of school until their hands got used to the bars, and my bandaid stash always ran low in September. :)
As often as we can, Beck and I spend a little time in one of the two prayer gardens at Q's school. I usually eat my yogurt while Beck climbs trees and runs around. Then we usually take a nature walk along the woods.
Rainy day....rainpants and boots. Over her dress.
Sunflowers from our garden.
Their schedule for each day. They are learning both German (the symbol is the eidelweiss) and Spanish. They are making their own swords for their play this Saturday. They also made their own knitting needles and will begin learning to knit soon!
We feel so confident about Quinn's place at her school this year. It was a decision we thought really hard about, but I am feeling peace that it is the right choice for her. She is starting 1st grade at 7, and I am really seeing that being a good thing for her. Her confidence, maturity, stamina (it's a loooong day at school for little ones), and enthusiasm have gotten an extra year to grow, and because of that she is really flourishing. She soaks up every single thing they do at school and comes home to tell us all about it! And best of all--she comes home from school happy this year! Past years she would turn into crazy-mean-Quinn the instant I picked her up, because she had been working so hard to hold herself together all day and process all the input she was receiving, and by the time she came home, she was just DONE. I haven't seen much of that this year and typically at pickup time she still has a bit of "oomph" left in her, which is a sign of her readiness for first grade, I feel. She loves being in a classroom of kiddos--she is such an extrovert that being with other people fills her up. She also seems to be getting on with her teacher really well, which is a relief to me. She had the greatest kinder teacher that she was really attached to, so I wondered how she would do with someone new.
She is still really tired at night and both kids get to bed by 7pm, sometimes a little earlier. They have to wake up a little before 7, so it's important they both get enough sleep. We've done better this year, as I mentioned, about getting up a little earlier and not rushing quite so much in the mornings, which is a huge thing for us. Beck is having a harder time with the early mornings, because he doesn't sleep in the afternoons anymore--he just has a rest time in his room (aka build all sorts of stuff and drive cars around on it time) and by evening he is exhausted.
So....that is school. There are many days that I am not super thrilled to be doing so much driving.....but all in all, it's worth it to have her school experience be so successful.
Meanwhile, Beck has his "school." He goes to speech once a week, which he loves!
A tiny bouquet for his speech teacher, Ms. P.
