Blog Blues

Ok, not really. I’ve intended to blog almost everyday this week but just wasn’t motivated enough to get to it. Each time I got close I hesitated because I felt a bit aloof with wanting to share my feelings about this week.

So exciting news! Dustin started Kindergarten. As usual I go through changes and stages with bags of mixed emotions. I’m almost afraid to admit it for fear of other mothers feeling guilty for “Oh My, feeling different!” (as we mother’s are so good at comparing ourselves and beating ourselves up for having different opinions or feelings), so just know that I admire all of you for who you are and how you live your lives, and especially how you parent. I mean come on, if I didn’t admire you, we probably wouldn’t be friends. With that said this week has been one of extreme excitement and a sad longing for a stage now done. I admit I’m one of those insane mom’s who dreads it when the school year starts. I enjoy having the kids at home, and somehow when I see them walk into school, my lack of memory skills makes me forget all the fighting, whining, complaining, and wild behavior that comes along with having kids at home, and then I become overly sentimental.

I don’t remember going through these emotions when Daria started school. Undoubtedly because she was my “first” and everything is so exciting. In fact I only remember getting sad for Dustin who painfully realized that his constant playmate was now gone all day. He would sit on the stairs with his chin in his hands, elbows on knees and say “I miss my Daria”. I still had Dustin at home to keep me occupied and my mind off of the fact that Daria was at school.

I am excited for Dustin. There was a sense of thrill as I watched him proudly enter his new classroom. It’s always fun to watch your kids face the new stages of life. Right before school started I started to worry, you know the long Guilt List of Motherhood: “Did I do enough with him?” “Did I teach him enough?” “What if he doesn’t do well because he didn’t attend pre-school?” The list goes on. Daria never had any problems starting school. I had her in a little pre-school co-op with some other mothers and home schooled her successfully teaching her to read. She was prepared and confident. I hoped for the same with Dustin. I chose to home school him for preschool which also turned out to be a lot of fun. It’s something I like to do and I recognize it’s not everyone’s bag of tea. I love teaching my kids, for those of you who know me you know I’ve always waffled on the decision to home school or public school. Both I think are great options. Because Dustin was a bit older before going to Kindergarten I had to step up my game and lesson plans, and include experiments and field trips. For us it worked out.

I was pleasantly surprised at how confident he seemed going to school the first day. All my fears kind of washed away. He’s so completely excited he can hardly stand it. On Tuesday he said “Mom, yesterday I liked school, but now I love it”. It is so fun to see him so excited and interested in learning.

With all that excitement I am also left with the residue of gracefully (or trying to at least) moving on to a different stage of motherhood (yeah right). Sure there are a lot of exciting options but I’m still accepting and dealing with my feeling of “missing the kids at home stage of life”. In time it will change but I’m all about validating feelings. I’m not the only one. I think Ken was just as sad as I was. His comment after walking Daria to her class was “they are growing up so fast”.

Monday after walking the kids to school I went to brunch with the girls at Panera, complete with the 50 pack of German chocolates that Betsty brought to celebrate. I abstained of course but enjoyed the aroma. That was a lot of fun. Coming home was odd. I’m so used to getting this routine going with Dustin. So I spent the day digging through closets and preparing things for a garage sale.

Now that my kids are in school I’m finding out a lot of things.

1.I’m still as busy as I was before. I just don’t have the extra dimension of integrating a kid into my lists of “to-do’s”
2.Of course I enjoy being able to do some things without kids, or having a babysitter, but the quietness in the house is deafening.
3.I miss the rustling of kid noises.
4.I like being able to do some things without finding someone to swap kids with.
5.I’m not a very funny person. In fact Daria and I are so much alike. We are very serious people. This can be a negative quality at times. Dustin on the other hand is a lot like Ken, trying to be funny all the time. Dustin is our “glad” boy, no matter what happens he is almost instantly glad or happy afterwards. This is a good quality. So I find that I miss the “positive” vibes that he would spread through the house. I think it was his daily goal to make me laugh. At times it would irritate me (some things he thinks are funny are just not funny to me).
6.I can actually look at my lists of projects or “have to do’s” and create some sort of schedule and feel like I’m accomplishing something.
7.I totally miss putting together school lessons. I’m a sucker for shopping at the teacher’s supply stores.
8.In the past the hours after school were the most harried. My hope was to get things prepared enough to spend some time with the kids when they got home. I’m finding that I don’t function well without a schedule. So far this week (are you ready for this….this comes from me and the kids who can literally go a week without watching TV), when the kids got home we went through backpacks, talked about their school days and then watched Little House on the Prairie….every day. I felt so off balance thinking there must be something I’m supposed to be doing. But I was doing something, enjoying time with the kids.
9.I am totally excited to be able to volunteer at the school more this year. I love that!
10.I’m finding that once you have your kids in school you start getting all sorts of advice or comments like “So what are you going to do now?”, “you are going to be so bored”, “you better get involved in this or that or you’ll go crazy” “now you can live your life!!” (As if I wasn’t living it before?)
11. I’m finding that you get a lot of questions that make you feel like you’re from another planet like “what in the world do you do all day?” “Why aren’t you going to get a job?” “you must love having all that time to yourself” (as if I’m spending all day pampering myself! Yeah right)

At any rate, it takes all of us mother’s to make the world go around, so I’m just going to keep going forward!