Back to School Time

I remember when I was growing up, seeing a commercial (it was for Wal Mart or Staples or something) with a dad dancing down the aisles to the song "It's the Most Wonderful Time of the Year" with his kids dragging their feet behind him and it was shown during the back to school time. As a kid, I sympathized with the kids (I absolutely hated and dreaded the start of a school year). As a parent, I'm much more like the dad now. I absolutely love an excuse to get the kids a couple new outfits and backpacks and crayons!

This year, we started back to school time with some hair cuts. With 3 girls and 1 boy we really don't go to hair places much. The girls we just let their hair grow and Pierce, we just tend to shave it ourselves. But I thought it would be fun to get everyone's trimmed up and looking nice and fresh. Cara decided she wanted to shave some of her hair. It was really hard for me to get on board with at first, but after a while I realized it's just hair and let her have some fun with it (and really hope she didn't regret it after). Lucy and Gwen just got cute trims (Gwen wants to grow her bangs out so we had to leave those alone). And Pierce got a cute cut.

Before haircuts

After haircuts

We went back to school shopping with Mom the weekend of the 10th and it was so fun to look at everything. It WASN'T fun, however, when every single cute outfit I found, the girls responded with "no, that's ugly!" (I thought having daughters would make shopping fun haha). We only had to stop at a couple stores, but we found lots of cute things. I had Larry cover new backpacks and water bottles, but I got clothes and umbrellas (they really didn't need crayons or any other typical supplies). 

Some of the cute outfits that were veto'd

It was a little hard to walk around (from my injury, I'll post on later) after a while, but it was still fun. Afterwards, we went to Mom's and chatted with her and Will for a bit, while the girls played in the yard.

This year, Cara goes into 2nd grade. She started on the 15th and has loved going. She doesn't have as many friends from her 1st grade class in this one, but she doesn't seem to mind. 

Gwen goes into Kindergarten (also on the 15th), but this year they have switched to all day Kindergarten. I think it's better for them (I've read it gives the teachers more 1:1 time with the kids). She doesn't get excited to go to school, but when she comes home she says she had fun.

Lucy started Preschool today. Hers is only the half day (we do PM so she's gone during nap time, it's much easier for us). She had a rough end to her 1st day, but she does seem to like it. I think the teacher has a soft spot for her since she's so teeny and cute (I'm not being biased here, the teacher was even saying how cute she was during her PEEP testing).

For the older girls' first day, I took them to school (I took the 15th off so I could take my time with it) and walked them to their doors so they knew where to go. I showed Gwen where to put her backpack and lunch box down and she ran off to play on the playground immediately. I then took Cara to her area and asked her if she wanted to go play or have me stay with her. She asked me to stay and we hung out (which was SO nice). After their first day I took all the girls out to Swig to get some fun first day sodas. They all just wanted a gummy shark, they didn't care about the actual soda (I got a sprite with some watermelon flavor and strawberry popping pearls, Cara got a sprite with a shark, Lucy got a lemonade with strawberry flavoring and a shark, Gwen got a root beer with coconut and a shark), but they did say it was good.

Today, after Lucy's first day we went out, as a family, for Froyo (our absolute favorite family treat). So that was fun.

Overall, I think it'll be a good school year. So far, everyone seems to like their teachers and classes and are making friends. Lucy only goes Tuesday through Friday, so she'll have long weekends, which I'm sure will be nice for her. I'm just so excited for them!