here we go again...

It's September and we are in full swing back to school mode around here.  Schedules and routines and homework and freshly sharpened pencils and lunch packing....

Reid started 2nd grade this year.  We are fortunate that his first grade teacher looped up and his entire class looped up with her.  So there is a lot of familiarity and comfort and that has helped the last week go very smoothly.

I typically spend the day before the first day of school trying not to cry or vomit and then I don't sleep at all the night before.  I don't do well with milestones.  It's an acknowledgement that time is passing and they are growing up.  No thank you.  I would like to just pass on that part.

Then, like every other mom on the planet, I wear my camera and stalk my child the entire morning for the first day of school. I couldn't resist looking back on the past three years.

This was last week:

and here is 1st grade:

and here is Kindergarten...

 Ugh.  It's heartwrenching for me to look at.  I tell you, sometimes I wish I could just bottle them up just the way they are keep the time from passing. 

But I can't.  So, I am going to enjoy this season of childhood. 

This season is filled with Star Wars obsession, spending hours studying Halloween costume catalogs trying  to decide just what to be this year, still being a little afraid of the dark, still crawling into Mom and Dad's bed a few days a week.  It's a time full of learning how to be a good friend and learning what means to have character.  Playing four square after school and then coming home to retreat for hours to build legos and read books.  Still kissing his Mama and his brother, even in front of his friends.  He still wants to hold my hand and he still wants to talk to me nonstop about everything under the moon and for all those things, I am grateful.

It's a good season and I am going to soak it all up.