a yellow sit-upon

Today was the last day of pre-school for our 2008-2009 school year. It was almost a manditory dress rehearsal for tomorrow's pre-K graduation. All the classes are singing in the ceremony, so all the kids needed to be here today. They sent a note home last week saying if your child does not normally attend on Fridays, you could bring them in at 9:00 and pick the up at 10:45! This meant for one morning, I could be child free! I asked Lew to meet me for coffee! Then, I told Gretchen that Carl was going to come to school with her and she immediately asked, "And you too Mommy? Maybe you will get a red sit-upon! And you could be Blessing Helper and you can have snack with us and play in the......" Get the point?

So, after 3.5 years of never having a break like this offered to me, what difference was 2 hours going to make? I havent' even had a cup of coffee since we all had the nasty stomach bug back in March. And, I love Noah's Ark. So, the more I thought about it, the more excited I got to be invited to sit for Circle Time next to the kids!

We altered the morning car song to "This is the way to Noah's Ark, let's go drop off Mommy!" We brought our pan of pumpkin muffins for the snack party and I brought the end of the year teacher gifts. We made garden stepping stones. Gretchen pushed in marbles, Carl pushed in clear glass flat marbles and I added their names and 2009. 4 teachers and 2 directors. We only have 2 molds, so we have been making these in pairs for about a week now and letting them dry before making 2 more. I guess that kind of adds to the Noah's Ark 2 by 2 idea, eh? They all came out really cool if I do say so myself - and now I have to have them make me one!

Circle Time was kind of short, so they could get to potty breaks and then get outside for snack. We did sing 2 songs and then Miss Teresa read The Little Mouse, The Red Ripe Strawberry and The Big Hungry Bear which is a huge favorite of both my kids! How cool to have it be the last story of the year! And, in case you are wondering... or have forgotten the title already, I did not get a red sit-upon like Gretchen predicted, I had a yellow one!

We had fun eating the snack outside, then the kids ran "races" - running back and forth between Tammy and Teresa 5-6 times to work off the snack. (Parents brought in the goodies... I made pumpkin muffins, there were also chocolate chip cookies, Krispy Kreme doughnuts brought in by Aiden's Pop-Pop, sugar color coated popcorn, gold fish crackers and juice boxes). Then we lined up and got into place for the dress rehearsal. All of the Noah's Ark children are singing 2 songs and the 2 year old class is the front row. Carl & Gretchen are freaking adorable, by the way! Carl doesn't do all the motions, but you could see him singing and he sway danced through the whole thing. Gretchen is super animated - not surprised, are you? I asked the 4 year old teacher to make me a copy of her rehearsal tape. I hope she does! I gave her a blank DVD when I picked up the kids today. Maybe I'll bring my camera and video tomorrow. I am a little worried Gretchen will react as she did at the Easter Parade, though, if she sees us. Then, she bolted for Lew in tears once she spotted us.

So, now it was 10:45 and the other Moms who had dropped off their kids returned to pick them up. One Mom did stay for the party, then took off for a bit, one Mom stayed the whole time like me and only one other Mom dropped off and didn't stay at all. By now, the kids were back in the classroom having free play, so I joined Gretchen, Reilly, and Blake (or was it Rylan? Yikes - I can't tell the boys twins apart, I don't spend enough time with them) in the kitchen area playing and helped Donovan and Aiden and Luke in hte dress-up clothes right there, too. It was so much fun!

A little after 11:00, I told Gretchen that Carl & I were going to go eat lunch and come back to get her in a little while. I wanted to be able to spend a little quiet one on one time with him. He was really good all morning with me there! Tammy asked me, "Do you play with them like this at home all day? You must be exhausted!" Then she asked if I get any adult interaction at all and I said only the 30 minutes that Tracy comes over for speech on Fridays. She said she wondered how parents with twins did it!

Carl & I had a good lunch together at Chick-Fil-A... he loves their french fries. He calls them "potatoes" and says it lovingly with each bite. Then we headed home for a bit. I threw in laundry adn filled the wading pool and then we headed back to get Gretchen. They gave each child a little goodie bag with playdough, bubbles and sidewalk chalk in it - 3 big hits around here! And they gave me 2 huge poster board sized envelopes with art work saved from throughout the year! Awww!!!! There were a couple photographs in each envelope, too, but each child had ones in there that I gave them! I thought that was kind of funny!

Nap got a really late start since we were waiting for the laundry to dry with sheets, mattress pads and Carl's blankets. So, they are still asleep at 4:15! I think Lew is coming home early and we are going to eat and go to Monkey Joe's again! It's pretty hot out - the car temp thing was hovering about 90* although I did see 96*. Can't always trust that thing, though.

Phew - that was long! I just wanted to record everything from their last day of their first year of school!