The dreaded day had come...Kindergarten registration

I'm really behind on blogging (what else is new). But I do have stories and journaling that bobble around in my head, just waiting to be written! Last week, I registered Big Sis for Kindergarten. I had been dreading this day for a long time, but I'm dreading even more the day I walk her to school for the first time and walk back home, crying miserably!

As a working mom, my kids are apart from me for a big chunk of every day. So that will be nothing new. It is more the potential for such impact from the outside world. The girls have gone to the same sitter for a long time (all of Little Sis' life) and the other four kiddos who go there are more like brothers and sisters. It is a small environment, where all the kids there have great parents and good values instilled, and our sitter is also such a great influence.

Now...it feels a bit like I'm throwing her to the lions. She'll actually have to carry a lunch tray to her seat by herself? Gulp. When kids pick on her on the playground, an adult won't be right there to fix it all? How ever will she survive? Not to mention she has got to be the smallest kid I saw at registration...by a whole head! Thank goodness she has a December birthday because if she was a young Kindergartener, she'd be even more of a runt.

I realize that as kids age, they just get more "fun." That has definitely been our experience so far. But...it is more of the outside influence thing that is scaring me about sending her to school. I don't want my tender little spirit to get hurt, laughed at, put down, or made to feel bad. I don't want her feeling pressure to "be" anyone other than herself.

I think maybe starting in grade school (definitely by high school) I may be asking God why we were blessed with girls rather than boys. She's already come home from preschool one day, sad because she wanted to be friends with a girl in her class and the friend told her "I can't, I already have a best friend necklace with another friend." I wanted to tell her "Honey, it doesn't end...women will be catty even into old age."

Drama Queen

At age 5, Big Sis may not have mastered her bike (even with training wheels), or be able to write in full sentences--but drama...that is something she has down pat. I'm not talking about the (numerous) melt downs she has each week or the tattletailing she does daily on her sis. Nope. I'm talking about her newest love...putting on performances!

She got a projector for Christmas that allows her to see an outline of various Disney characters and things from Disney movies and a few days ago went to town drawing every last character from Snow White. Then she went to town coloring and cutting these pictures in to turn them into props. She turned on the "spotlight" in the family room and said she was ready for us to "watch the play."

Daddy and I were quite impressed! She had the storyline down very nicely and I am surely giving myself a pat on the back for filling her to the brim with story time and reading to her like mad from the time she was growing in my belly. Nah...probably has nothing to do with it honestly. But she was quite good at the sequencing aspect of the play and I was impressed she had thought of all the props she'd need. The funniest part of the play is the very beginning. She puts the evil queen's "mask" on that she drew, so you can't see Big Sis' face, and stomps on the ground saying "I don't like Snow White, I don't like Snow White, I need to find a hunter who will get rid of her for good!" Not quite the seasoned little actress yet, as she's stomping her foot, she's got some bursts of giggling going on!

If I ever get super technical, I should post one of her plays on the blog.