First Day of School

September 08, 2011

First Day of School

Unfortunately due to the pouring rain we have had over the past few days, I haven't been able to take the obligatory first day to school photos.

Both kids are doing great adjusting to their new school year. They are attending the same school. Waverly's classroom went through a lot of changes this year - new teachers, 1:1, PT. Thankfully, the IAs have remained the same and the new teachers both seem wonderful. I hope to pop into her classroom next week at some point to talk with her new 1:1.

Oliver is doing great. He is in the same classroom as last year, with his summer school teacher. She is lovely and he seems to respond well to her. He switched to afternoon preschool, which was a little difficult for him the first day.

(Sorry I couldn't flip the photo around.) Oliver fell asleep on his first day of school. He was up at 4:00 am, so by 2:00 he was ready for a nap. I love his little bum up in the air. I drop him off each afternoon and then he rides home on the bus with Waverly at the end of the day.

All in all a successful first day of school for my second grader and preschooler.

Comments

Erin Thompson said…

I came to school to meet Oliver in the midst of this nap, so I witnessed this pose first-hand. :) My son sleeps the same way. Looking forward to seeing him next week when he is awake!

September 9, 2011 at 4:59 PM

Welcome to Holland

By Emily Perl Kingsley

I am often asked to describe the experience of raising a child with a disability - to try to help people who have not shared that unique experience to understand it, to imagine how it would feel. It's like this......When you're going to have a baby, it's like planning a fabulous vacation trip - to Italy. You buy a bunch of guide books and make your wonderful plans. The Coliseum. The Michelangelo David. The gondolas in Venice. You may learn some handy phrases in Italian. It's all very exciting.After months of eager anticipation, the day finally arrives. You pack your bags and off you go. Several hours later, the plane lands. The stewardess comes in and says, "Welcome to Holland.""Holland?!?" you say. "What do you mean Holland?? I signed up for Italy! I'm supposed to be in Italy. All my life I've dreamed of going to Italy."But there's been a change in the flight plan. They've landed in Holland and there you must stay.The important thing is that they haven't taken you to a horrible, disgusting, filthy place, full of pestilence, famine and disease. It's just a different place.So you must go out and buy new guide books. And you must learn a whole new language. And you will meet a whole new group of people you would never have met.It's just a different place. It's slower-paced than Italy, less flashy than Italy. But after you've been there for a while and you catch your breath, you look around.... and you begin to notice that Holland has windmills....and Holland has tulips. Holland even has Rembrandts.But everyone you know is busy coming and going from Italy... and they're all bragging about what a wonderful time they had there. And for the rest of your life, you will say "Yes, that's where I was supposed to go. That's what I had planned."And the pain of that will never, ever, ever, ever go away... because the loss of that dream is a very very significant loss.But... if you spend your life mourning the fact that you didn't get to Italy, you may never be free to enjoy the very special, the very lovely things ... about Holland.