Tuesday, September 22, 2015

Cooper's First Day of 2.5 Pre-K!

I wasn't able to go to drop Cooper off for his first day of preschool, but Daddy did a great job on his own!  Cooper was so excited to go to school and didn't see to be nervous at all!  Matt got some great pictures before they headed off to school.



I love this!



My silly boy.






Matt took this while they were waiting in the car in the parking lot.  This silly boy is my heart.  He also took this video of Cooper telling me where he was!

Here's this handsome boy outside of school going in on his first day!  Matt knew how much I wanted to be there, so he took another video before they went inside.

Outside his classroom!  Their theme is super heroes!


Mrs. Lisa showing him how to put his bag in his cubby (or 'cuvvy' as he calls it).


Matt said he went straight for the toys and was none concerned with if Matt left or not - haha.


This fish is his favorite!




Grammy and Pop said that he talked nonstop about school when they picked him up on the first day.  They also said he ate a huge lunch and then crashed - haha.  When I got there to pick him up, he had this super cute cookie in his bookbag to celebrate his first day!



I am so proud of my big boy!  We are a month into school now and he still absolutely loves it.  I can't wait to see how much he grows and learns this year!



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Monday, September 21, 2015

Cooper's Open House

All last year, we knew we wanted to start Cooper in pre-k this August.  With Cooper having a middle of the summer birthday, we had a decision to make.  Do we make him the oldest or youngest in the class?  Since his birthday is in June, he will either start out the year as the age that everyone else will turn, OR he won't turn that age until after the school year is over.  For example: in Kindergarten, most kids start at 5 years old and turn 6 during the year.  Well.  With Cooper, we had to decide: Do we start him at 5 and he stays five the entire year (and doesn't turn 6 until the summer after Kindergarten ends), OR do we start him at 6 years old and he stays 6 the entire school year (which is the age most of his classmates will turn during the year).  We really put so much thought into it.  We talked to our families.  We talked to several different teachers of younger grades.  We talked to friends.  We talked this subject to death.  In the end, we took into consideration that Cooper is a boy (and will probably mature later) and that he is still playing catch-up in the speech department.  With both of those things in mind, we decided to make him the oldest in his class.  What this meant for preschool is that, even though he turned 3 this past summer, he would start pre-k in the 2.5 year old class.  This will actually mean that he has 3 years of pre-k.  With LL, we didn't start until she was in the 3 year old class (what Cooper will do next year), so she only did 2 years.  

It actually ended up working so well, and we can tell that God was all over this situation!  His preschool has two 2.5 year old classes.  They ended up making Cooper's class the "older" class (with the kids who are either already 3 or turning 3 very soon after school starting).  This means that there isn't a huge age gap between him and the other kids!  He also ended up getting two amazing teachers.  Mrs. Kori is actually one of my friends.  So she's known about all of Cooper's speech issues since the start.  And she has had daughters go through speech therapy, too.  Mrs. Lisa goes to church with us, has two young boys, and (you guessed it) has had a son go through speech therapy (with the same speech therapist that Cooper had!).  I'm telling you - it worked out so much better than I ever could have imagined!

Cooper's school year didn't start until after mine, so I was actually pretty bummed thinking that I was going to miss open-house and the first day of school.  Thankfully, I have an amazing academic coach at school who watched my class for me for a little bit one day so that I could go to Cooper's open house really quickly.

I wish I had more pictures, but I don't.  On the way in, Cooper was nervous and was not having pictures.  Then, when we were in the class, we were either watching Cooper or talking to the teachers, so we didn't take pictures then.  On the way out, Cooper cried (because he wanted to stay!), so this is the only one we got.  Which is actually pretty funny to me.  :)

I am so excited to my boy and the opportunity that he has to go to school and have some time that is all just for him.  I know he is going to love it and grow so much this year!


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Wednesday, September 16, 2015

LL's 1st Day of 1st Grade

Unlike last year, we had an absolutely wonderful first day of school!  Last year, I woke up about 10 minutes before we were supposed to leave. (!!!)  This year, we woke up in plenty of time and were ready and excited!  On the first day of school, I drive LL there and walk her to her class.  The rest of the year, I drive to my school and she rides a bus from my school to her school.  When we left in the morning, we couldn't take her first day pictures because it was still dark outside!  When we got to her school at 7, there was enough light so we took her pictures before we went in.  

She picked out her outfit all by herself.  I loved how happy and excited she was for her first day!



My happy, sweet, beautiful girl!



Ready to go inside!


We found her classroom and she had a page to color while all the kids arrived.


LL and her 1st grade teacher, Mrs. Cindy!

When she got to my classroom that afternoon, she was so happy and said she had a great day!  She had a cute "I completed my first day of first grade" paper and pencil.


Here's a look at all of her first days of school pictures.  She's growing so fast!!


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Tuesday, September 15, 2015

LL's First Grade Open House

LL's open house for 1st grade was the same day as my 6th Grade Orientation for my new students.  Luckily, it wasn't at the same time.  Matt brought LL and met me at my school.  We took some pictures in my classroom and then headed out to meet her teacher!






I loved it this year because LL was absolutely not nervous at all.  She was excited for school to start and excited to meet her new teacher.  It was such a change from last year!



I didn't take any pictures while we were at the Primary school.  But we met her teacher, found her seat, and filled out some paperwork.  She left loving her teacher and excited for the first day of school!



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