The First Day of School!!!



Cheyanne's teacher asked them to draw her a picture
and bring a "friend" to her first 40min. day.



Wow, I can not believe that I have experienced a first day of school with one of my kids! I just can't believe that time has gone that quickly. I remember my first day of school pictures that my mom took every year, especially the embarrassing one standing on the bus steps while the whole school bus waited for her to take the perfect picture and our bus driver laughing as he waited! Thanks mom. It just seems surreal that my baby girl is grown up and off to school. At least now a days the first day of school spans about a week, or at least it did in our house. We took pics of her first visit to school, her first half day by herself, and her first full day of school. Michael laughed at me and said that by the time Mason is in school we will probably forget to even take a photo of his first day, but I doubt it. She loves school! Her first short day she seemed a bit nervous, but every day since she is so eager to go that she forgets to say goodbye to me! I think her favourite part is the fact that she gets to have lunch there, she is always making sure that I haven't forgotten to pack it for her. She has a great friend in her class that we carpool with, and I love listening to their conversations on the drive. The other day Cheyanne was encouraging Anna to pray when she has bad dreams, what a neat bond they have already as sisters in Christ. I get to go along on her first field trip next week, and I think I am more excited than she is, I can't wait to observe her with her classmates!

          Cheyanne going to school has also provided me with one of my first major recollections of an I will never moment. Before you have kids you always have ideas or opinions about what your kids will do or say, or won't do or say, and then you have kids and realize that it isn't entirely up to you, and they just might do or say exactly what you thought they would never do, and likely it will be embarrassing, lol. I don't think that I had a lot of things that I believed my kids wouldn't do, but I do know that I definitely said I would never send my kids to a Christian school. I am not sure exactly why  I felt this way, perhaps it was because I went through the public school system, or knew kids who had more problems at a Christian school than a public one, or simply because I want our family to be in touch with our community, but for what ever reasons, I clearly said I wouldn't do it. Well, I have to eat my words because Cheyanne is going to King's Christian School in Salmon Arm. For a number of reasons this was the best choice for our family. It wasn't an easy decision, and even after we had made it I feared that we might have made the wrong decision or maybe we didn't pray about it enough before we decided, or maybe I wasn't listening and God had really directed us differently. Cheyanne's first week of school has completely erased all those fears, I feel that it has totally confirmed that we followed God's leading. It was so amazing for me to go to Cheyanne's forty minute orientation and see her teacher pray with her, to hear her come home from her second day of class singing "Our God is so Big, Our God is so Good," and to watch her come home from school with an emphasis on manners and kindness. My biggest fear about the first day of school was that I would be sending my naive little five year old into a classroom of her peers and I would begin to see her character slide. I know it has only been a week and she will likely pick up some undesirable habits, but I do feel that she is in a place that will nurture her character. I don't know if all of our kids will attend kindergarten at the Christian school I suppose we will have to see where God is leading when the time comes, but for Cheyanne, I believe it was the best decision we could make. Isn't it great to have a God who cares enough about us to lead us in decisions that seem so minuscule, I mean really, it's just kindergarten right?

Cheyanne loves her lunch kit!!

Cheyanne and Anna going for their first time alone,
it was only half a day and I still found I couldn't talk
about it without getting choked up!

Eventually all the kids' pictures go in the flower centres



Isn't this such a beautiful hallway?



she is ready for her first full day, backpack and all!

She chose a Tinkerbell backpack, we loved
back to school shopping together!!