… Thank GOD!  I think all three of us let out a collective sigh last night as we got clothes laid out and the backpack ready.  Matthew has been going to preschool since he was 2, so this was just another rung on the ladder for us.  After 2 years of preschool and 2 summers full of camps every-other-week, he was ready to be back at school.  It was exciting, but uneventful, just how I like it!

Matthew insisted on having a fire truck shirt for the first day of school, so I headed off to Ga.p last week to get the one that he liked after he asked for it three times (he’s very flakey right now and really doesn’t care too much about clothes, and I wanted to be sure so I asked him over and over again for days).  It was a big win… until he got his “Food Truck Shirt” (truly, it has food trucks on it and he is fascinated by food trucks).  This morning, he said no to the fire truck shirt and asked for his food truck shirt, but it was literally in the washer so that was a no.  He’ll wear it tomorrow.

Hottie was out-of-town on a work trip (my fault, I forgot to put the first day of school on his calendar) so it was just the boys and me this morning.  Matthew does not like having his picture taken – he’s told me so several times – so I asked him to please smile for 5 pictures and then we’d go get a donut before school.  He didn’t know that the donut was happening no matter what, so he obliged!  Bryson wanted to sit on the porch with Matthew for every picture, and Matthew was perfectly fine with that and even asked him to help him hold up his sign.  Bryson was NOT happy about Matthew leaving.  He would not smile for me and just looked so sad the whole time.  I didn’t read into it, I thought he was just a bit tired.

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We headed off for donuts and that was fun – and FAST!  Matthew is as neat as a pin, so Bryson lapped him on the donut consumption but we had plenty of time for him to take his sweet time eating (like his dad!).  Sprinkle donuts for both boys!

We got to school too early and had to hang out outside his classroom.  Matthew was so excited, he could not wait to get in there!  We took a few extra pictures before heading in to the cubbies.  It was fun watching Matthew welcome and hug his old friends and make new friends instantly.  The kid is a master at introducing himself and asking his friends their names and then asking them something about themselves.  He truly amazes me every day with his friendly, outgoing personality!  Bryson didn’t want to leave his brother’s side and I should have known it was going to be rough when we had to leave.

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It was finally, finally, time to go into the classroom so he ran in, washed his hands, grabbed his name tag, and kissed me goodbye.  “Bye, Mom!  I love you!”  That was it… with Matthew.  Bryson did not want to leave and I had to tear him out of there.  He was kicking and screaming the whole way to the car and then several miles down the road.  “Don’t take me, don’t take me, MOM.  I want Matthew!  I want to play with school toys with Matthew.  Go back, go back NOW!”  It was the worst melt-down he’s ever had, which isn’t really saying much because neither of my kids completely freak out very often, but it was definitely a melt-down.  It was not good.

We ran errands, Bryson played at the mall play area, and it was time to go back to school (short days to ease them into it this week).  I left Bryson in the car – I did not want a repeat of the freak-out – and went in to get my big kid.  Matthew came running out, said he had a great day, said he didn’t get in trouble (yes, I asked), and asked for his brother.  I reunited them in the parking lot and all was right in the world.  🙂

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Upon our arrival home after the park and lunch, we noticed that the neighbor’s dumpster was being picked up by a dumpster truck, so of course we had to watch that before calling it a morning/afternoon and heading to naps and quiet time.  You don’t see a dumpster truck every day  😉

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It was a great first day!

Bryson’s first day is Thursday.  I am expecting full cooperation and excitement.  We shall see…