Lily's First Day at Preschool

Well, the day has finally come... Lily is officially a Preschooler!  She has been talking about school for months, ever since we registered her in the springtime.  Then there were a couple of play-days at the school over the summer, so the place has already been established in her mind as one of the best places to go to have fun.  So she was very excited to go to school this morning.

When we arrived at her classroom, she acted like she'd been to school hundreds of times before - she somehow knew exactly where to put her lunch bag and happily placed her snack in the snack basket.  She found her name by the hooks and hung up her backpack all by herself, then found her place at the table and took a seat so I could take a picture.  She gave me a quick hug and ran off to play with the other kids.  No teary goodbye from this little girl!  Mommy, on the other hand, went to the car and cried for awhile.  After already having cried a few times while getting Lily ready for school.  Goodness gracious, you'd think she was moving off to college, as bent out of shape as I was this morning!

Don't mistake my tears, though.  They were mostly happy tears.  I'm incredibly excited for Lily... She'll have so many great experiences at school, making new friends and learning all sorts of new things.  She will love school, and her being in school will give Dylan some one-on-one time that he deserves too.  Lily going to school is a good thing for all of us.  Yet at the same time, I'm just not ready for her to be such a big-girl, so grown up.  Time is going WAY too fast these days.

At the end of the school day, I arrived at the classroom a few minutes early.  I was able to observe Lily in her class without her knowing I was there at first, which was fun.  The teacher was reading a book to the class, and Lily was in the middle of the group of kids.  After the story was finished and Lily saw me, she was really excited to give me hugs and tell me all about her day.  The last three pictures below are from the end of the day.  She had a great first day at school!  And she was worn out - she took a nice long nap after school today, even though she usually doesn't take a nap at all.  Preschool must be hard work!