Pictures from Last day of Preschool

End of Preschool

This week I have been acutely aware of the end of an era, the end of bringing Avery with me during the week when I drive to work. If I had to add up all the hours we have spent commuting since she was 3 months old, it probably ends up being thousands of hours in the car together. She has gotten so much more fun as the years have gone by. We have conversations about all kinds of things, from where the sun rises and sets to who she enjoyed playing with at school that day.

Last week Jon and I realized that it didn't make sense for her to go to school after 6/29 because she would only be there a few days in the next 2 months due to swim lessons, in-town company and a trip to the South, so I let her know 6/19 that she had 5 more days of school left. I thought she might be upset, but she was fine, happy even.

Recently, Landon has been crying incessantly on the drive home from school and Wednesday I sat in the front seat and marveled at how Avery will sing to him when I want to pull my hair out or scream! She must have sung 5 rounds of "Hush Little Baby" followed by "Twinkle Twinkle" followed by "Rock-a-bye Baby" and lastly "ABC's" until he Finally fell asleep. I will miss these precious moments. She also has taken to distracting him in the morning when I drop them off so he is not upset when I leave them. I hope he can start distracting himself now that she won't be with us. Friday was her last day. We made black-bottom cupcakes for the teachers and kids on Thursday. Avery was a big help in the kitchen, we made 8 dozen cupcakes! 6 dozen were mini cupcakes though. She loved licking the spatula and bowl.

Avery has been excited for her last day. She is excited to be "off school for the summer". I got through the morning ok, just a little teary eyed as I looked back to wave goodbye. Fine during the day until I went to pick them up and Teacher Edna, her teacher from blue group when she was 3 years old, had put a picture of her in the mailbox for us. I got totally choked up looking at how she has grown. We are so proud of Avery. She is growing up and we are excited for this next chapter in her life.

"Da"

Our little guy is growing up. He is funny and loving. He is slowly but surely outgrowing his "bang my head on the floor, or bite you, or hit you when I am frustrated" phase. Thank goodness.
He calls out to us throughout the day, "mama!!" "dada!" He says "da" for yes and often says "no!" when he means yes. Jon has figured out if he says no but you think he means yes, ask him to say please and if he says please (signing) then he really means yes. We have been asking him to say "Avery" for a few weeks now. He says something unintelligible and then we ask him again and he says "dada", reliably. It's so cute and sweet. The nickname "gogo bear" has seemed to stick, at least for now, thanks to Avery now we all call him gogo bear more than Landon.
He is about to transition to the toddler room at school next week. He will have the same teachers that Avery had when she was a little one. Teachers Sheila and Beverly. I like both of them very much and know that he will love them. I went to talk with Miss Sheila and saw all the little ones asleep on their cots. It is hard to believe he is finished with cribs at school, growing up. I also remember when Avery transitioned to this class they told me she would be drinking from cups and would not miss the bottle and they were right. So I have sort of just waited for him to go to the toddler class to start weaning the bottle aggressively because I know they will help me so much with this transition. They are doing lots of water play now that it is summer time and he will love this.
The teachers were sharing with me about seeing Avery after her piano lesson in the community area interacting with Landon during his snack time. He kept going to her and giving her hugs and he became upset when his teachers told him it was time to go back into the infant room so Avery said "Landon you need to go with your teachers into your room now" and he listened to her. They really are so sweet to each other, almost all the time.