Preschool

My middle child had an orientation for her new preschool today.  We had a fabulous morning!!  We Mom slept in a little, we sent big sister to school, dropped little brother off to daycare, drove through Mickey D's for a parfait treat and took it to Mom's office.  Everyone fawned over her and at first she lavished the attention, but gradually decided it was too much and shied away.  I had a few things to accomplish, so she happily sat at my desk and chatted a thousand miles an hour and ate her parfait while Mom did boring things on the computer.  When it was time we held hands and skipped to the car (dropping the parfait in the parking lot, which made both of us giggle and hope local wildlife enjoy strawberries) and went to orientation.  We skipped into the building, met her teacher, played tag in the gym, had a snack and listened to the rules, then skipped back to the car to join little brother at daycare.

Thanks for the best morning I've had in a very long time, my way-too-big-too-soon baby girl.  I hope you have an amazing experience in your new school, and while I know you probably won't remember today just know that it meant the world to me to share it with you.

Happy Monday!

I always start conversations with my best friend this way on Monday mornings.  We're two time zones away, so sometimes this gets to her at 5:00 a.m. and sometimes she sends it to me at 1:00 p.m., but we both know it means, "Here's to another week, may we survive until Thirsty Thursday and the weekend!"  So, my friends, Happy Monday!

When I dropped my kids off to the Angel sitter this morning I encouraged them to tell her about our weekend.  Always curious to find out what they've remembered, I never prompt with, "Tell Angel about the art fair..." but rather, "What did we do this weekend?"  Typically they start with what happened last night (We had family game night!  We watched a movie and had popcorn!) and work backwards.  This morning my eldest immediately blurts out, "We went grocery shopping!!"  Um... okay... do you recall the last day of swimming lessons where you got to ride in a canoe?  How about the art festival?  Or our trip to the gigantic playground?  Monopoly?  Nope... my children remember I managed to feed them.  I guess the alternative could be, "My Mom pushed me down the stairs," which was the answer she gave her daycare provider at the tender young age of TWO and caused a bit of a ruckus.  Luckily she had been going to this particular provider for awhile, so the director knew she wasn't an abused child, but her teacher that day was new and apparently immediately marched her down to the front office.

This morning dawned with a new opportunity... we have a new employee starting today.  I have been anticipating this event for awhile, my chance to start fresh and get onboarding right, to show off the new office team that I am so proud of and prove that we can integrate a new employee and make them feel welcome.  So far she's had to wait for me to finish printing off the handbook, been locked out of the computer system, can't take the Practice Management system training because they're doing maintenance work, and hasn't met half of the staff because nobody was in this morning when I took her around.  Hey, chances for improvement!!  There's always a silver lining.  I'm not calling it a complete failure because I'm an incurable optimist and I have the rest of the day to salvage.  I do also have to change over to a new payroll system to ensure everyone gets paid on Thursday, make decisions regarding our insurance renewal so nobody has a lapse in coverage, and take my daughter's birth certificate to her new school (yes, secretary, I remember that you need the birth certificate and a utility bill with our new address.  I haven't forgotten, I'm just juggling a lot of things and you're being shifted around the priority list because school doesn't start until Sept 3.  Thank you for making sure my kid can start on time and keeping the school organized.  Stop leaving me voicemails).  However, this eager new hire is my priority today and I want to start her career here on a positive note, without leaving her sitting around wondering what to do or where to find the restroom.  So I'm going to take her to lunch and to the other office and be available for questions at any time.  You can have the birth certificate and immunization records tomorrow, and the new payroll implementation specialist can call my cell phone.  I have a life to change today.