1st Day of School

Although Little M is still in preschool, he attends preschool at the local elementary school so he follows the public school system schedule. Today was the first day of school. He did great! He has the same teacher as last year since it's a preschool class for developmental delays. His teacher, whose last name happens to be the same as Little M's first name, said he did really well today -- no problems with using the potty, he remembered their routines from last year and played well with all his classmates.

Way to go Little M! Such a big boy!

Getting ready to leave

Hugging Shaggy

Cubby he shares with his best bud at school, Justin

The "everything you need to know if 5 minutes" post

Busy, busy, busy! And so many things to update that it'd take days to give you all the details so here's the Reader's Digest condensed version.

• Big M successfully completed his last semester as a Chemical Engineering Junior! YAY!! This is supposed to be the toughest semester of the entire curriculum so hopefully it's smooth sailing into this final year of school.
• He's still trying to find a summer internship. Oy.
• Little M wears Big Boy Underwear (tm) all the time except during naps and overnight. I'm so incredibly proud of his progress!
• Shaggy has an ear infection. We always get Augmentum because Amoxicillin doesn't work for her. After 48 hours on the meds, I have a suspicion that the drugstore gave her Amox. She can't fall asleep tonight and has lost her appetite. Ugh.
• I started a new site a month ago and it's kicking booty! I feel like the site is doing well with traffic but I need to be more organized about adding content. Phase 2 is big and will be the actual money maker. I can't wait to share details once everything is finalized!
• Because of Shaggy's ear infection and incessant waking during the night, my sleep schedule is really off -- which is why I was scrubbing my kitchen cabinet doors at 5 am. What else do you do at 5 am when your days and nights are all mixed up?
• I had my mom chop off all my hair. It's bobbed and my bangs are growing out. For the first time in.... gee.... wow... probably 25 years, I don't have bangs. I would tell you all about the traumatic forehead smacking that occurred in Jr./Sr. high school but honestly, it's not worth the time. It was funny and didn't really traumatize me. (I'm dramatic like that sometimes) LOL
• I keep forgetting to plan Shaggy's 2nd birthday party. Oops! Tomorrow, I promise!
• I had Little M's IEP review today with his school. This is to go over his goals for the year to help with his developmental delays and prepare him for kindergarten. I cannot express enough how stellar his teachers are. They amaze me. They really do. Short version: M still has delays but has made incredible progress. He'll remain in the PDD program next year, for which I am very grateful. We're on the waiting list for PDD summer school.

On being June Cleaver...

Here's a few things you should know before reading any further:

1. Each week, a parent is responsible for supplying afternoon snacks for the children in my son's preschool class. This is my week.
2. I asked for and received The Sneaky Chef for Christmas but have barely cracked it open.
3. I really, really, really, really, REALLY stink when it comes to baking cookies. Just ask any one in my graduating class. They weren't called hockey pucks because they were round.
4. I planned to make Cinnamon Rattlers, Breakfast Cookies, PB&J Muffins, Grilled Cheese Muffins and something else I can't remember at the moment.
   
5. I love my son dearly and you're about to hear about the depths of that love.

Two days ago, I attempted to make Cinnamon Rattlers, a recipe from The Sneaky Chef. It was a pretty simple recipe - chick peas, sugar, cinnamon and a pinch of salt; cook until they are dry and crispy. How hard can it be? Considering that I have ruined my second batch, you can deduce that I do not have the requisite level of skill to successfully bake the heck out of some measly little chick peas!

I feel like Goldilocks -- the first batch wasn't done enough and the second was over done (translation: burnt). Even the non-burnt chick peas of the 2nd batch weren't completely dried out so it might as well have been a third failure.

Well, while the Cinnamon Rattlers II were on their way to being destroyed tonight, I was also trying to make the Breakfast Cookies. Little M helped me mash up the Total cereal. He poured in the flour, baking soda, salt, sugar, etc. He was so proud of himself and we talked about telling all his friends at school about the cookies tomorrow.

Yes, we had high hopes. And I was so very clever! I was able to fit more than half of the cookie dough onto the first cookie sheet! Speedy baking at its best except for one small detail: I followed the instructions and cooked them for 18 minutes without checking on them.

Yep, that first batch was black. Big M said they were edible and good. Little M proudly ate one and didn't even choke on the char.

I made slightly smaller serving sizes and stuck the next batch into the oven. They came out perfect! Then I counted. I needed at least two cookies per child (quick! do the math! 2 cookies being crammed into 7 little pie holes!) and I always try to give the teachers a little something so I needed at least 16 cookies. Remember, most of the dough was burnt on that overzealously overstuffed first cookie sheet.

I had 11 good, edible, non-caustic cookies. I needed 5 more. I further reduced the serving sizes and was able to eek out five more cookies. As they cooled on the cookie sheet on top of the oven, I put the 11 good cookies into a container.

Fast forward about 15 minutes. Big M comes downstairs and goes into the kitchen. He comes out of the kitchen and starts to go up the stairs. Out of the corner of my eye, I see a cookie in his hand! "NO!!!!!", I shouted, "I NEED THOSE COOKIES! I have just enough."

-- insert deer-in-the-headlights-look --

"You already ate one, didn't you?"

-- deer-in-the-headlights-look remains unphased --

"I had just enough! I had JUST enough! I had just enough....."

Okay. Um. Plan C? PB&J muffins or Grilled Cheese Muffins, right? Yes, well, here's the thing.

Sneaky Chef relies on you making "make ahead" purees that you use as the base for many of your recipes. These two recipes required the Orange Puree which is made from cooked-until-they-give-up-and-limply-beg-for-pity yams and carrots. I had not yet made this Orange Puree because I wasn't planning on making these recipes until Monday night.

Are you starting to feel my panic?

Well, I'll spare you the additional painful details for the most part. While my Orange Puree ingredients boiled away on the stove top, I grabbed a box of cake mix, added a stick of melted butter and an egg, mixed and formed it into little balls, plopped them on the cookie sheets and made some cake mix cookies.

So much for healthy. So much for my June Cleaver Mom Of The Year award. So much for feeling so superior for providing such healthy alternatives to the junk the kids normally get. And so much for my complaining to the teachers about the unhealthy snacks.

Our first parent-teacher conference

Little M is enrolled in preschool through the public school system. His classroom is at the local elementary school so we follow their schedule. Today was parent-teacher conference day. As a child, I always dreaded these conferences. I hated knowing that they were talking about me and I had no idea what they were saying. It's an issue I still have as an adult actually!

Anyway, for once I was very excited about parent-teacher conference day. I was very excited to sit down with Little M's teacher and discuss his progress.

Neither Big M nor I were surprised to learn that the teacher never has to deal with tantrums from our son. Of course not! Why would he waste a tantrum on school when he can throw a big one at home? But all in all, he's doing well. His socialization is improving as is his speech. We discussed that he still has a very hard time relaying to us what he experiences during the day and that he isn't stringing sentences into conversations. But these are the reasons he's enrolled in the developmentally delayed class so we aren't upset by this. We do see progress, as does his teacher, and that's what matters.

Do I hear a school bell?

We received notification of the school Little M will attend for preschool. (He has some speech delays and qualifies for the Richmond City public school assistance to prepare him for kindergarten. This means that he'll attend preschool classes at an elementary school.)

I have to call to set up a registration meeting.

I'm registering my baby for school. School people. SCHOOL. He's going to go to the big kid school. He's going to be there with 5th and 6th graders. My sweet baby. My baby. I'm still shocked that this is happening.

He is going to love it -- I hope! And I'm so excited for him. The prospect of seeing him learn and grow in leaps and bounds is so exciting.

But at the same time, it's one more step forward towards independence and loosening of the apron strings. It's bittersweet. And it also means that the first day of kindergarten will be anti-climatic.

I'm thrilled to see him grow. I'm sad to say goodbye to my newborn, my infant, my toddler; he's a preschooler now. I didn't expect to be shopping for school supplies so soon.

Hello preschooler. Whatcha know?

Ready?

My two-and-a-half year old son starts day camps next week. He'll be going twice a week from 9am - 12pm. I signed him up for day camps to help get him ready to go to preschool five days a week in the fall.

I started thinking about it a few minutes ago and had that chest tightening feeling of panic. I'm not ready. *I* am not ready.

How will he survive without me? How will people understand what he's saying? Will they know what he needs? Will he ... but won't he.... but.. but.... but what about Momma??

How will I survive him growing up?