Day 1 of 180

Despite Micah's adamant declarations that he was not ready for school, he kind of came around to the idea at the end. A friend stopped in for a minute the night before the first day and asked him if he was ready for school.

Yep.

"Liar," I replied. Because that's not at all what he'd told us, every time we asked him about school.

He had a hard time falling asleep last night (as did most of the kids going back to school all over the county, from what I read on the internet), and asked for melatonin. And then he was up at 5:30, sneaking the iPad into bed with him. After it was confiscated, he went back to sleep. I did not.

I woke him after I packed his lunch, wrote important notes to all his new teachers, packed his book bag, and picked out his clothes. He was not happy to be awakened. (Who ever is? And why can't kids grasp the fact that if they don't like to be awakened, why on earth would mommy want that?) After grumpily walking downstairs and getting dressed, he resigned himself to his fate. In fact, he was rather excited to be going to school. 

He visited Becky's room and gave her a hug and kiss, then turned around to show off his new super hero back pack. She asked him if he was excited for school. "Yeah." And he was. He held the Back To School 2013 sign all morning and wouldn't put it down. I had to confiscate it from him when the bus came. He wanted to take it to school with him. He happily posed for photos with the boys in the traditional "let's just do this to make mama happy" pictures. And then he ran to catch the bus because mama almost made him late on his first day.

It took Micah all summer to get to the point that he was excited for school to start again. It took that long for me to come to terms with the fact that my baby is a 5th grader. And contrary to popular opinion, it's not that HESMYBABYOHMYGOSH. It's far more the fact that he's nowhere near being a 5th grader in so many ways. I've never been happy putting Micah in age appropriate grades. I'm thinking this year I'll have a chat with the school and we'll send him next year as a 5th grader as well. I mean, how on earth can you expect my nugget to go to high school in just 2 years? He's not ready for that mentally, emotionally, or even physically. (And certainly not academically!) So this is the first day of 5th grade for Micah. There may or may not be another first day of 5th grade for him. And he had a super fabulous day, as did all the boys. It was a win all around.