Emotions are flowing

This has been a very emotional week.  All the kids started school.  Simone has gone to a "school" two days a week for about a year, but now she is going with the boys at the International Schoolhouse.  She is going five mornings a week, along with Joseph.  They both have been adjusting really well.  I am so proud of both of them.  I look forward to picking them up at 11:45, eating lunch together and playing until they take a nap.  It is nice quality time.

Then there is Samuel.  He just started Kindergarten.  He is going to the International Schoolhouse too.  He goes from 8:45 to 3:45.  It is a long day.  He is so happy, which makes me happy but I am so sad too.  I truly can't believe that 5 years have gone by and he is now in school full time.  I remember on my rough days at home I would think that I couldn't wait for him to go to Kindergarten and now I just miss my buddy.  Now that he isn't here, I miss those afternoons of him following me around.  "Can I help you cook? Can I help make dinner? Can we play go fish? Can we play war? Can we play checkers? Can we play video games?"  The list goes on, but as annoying as it was some days I miss him terribly.  The first day that I dropped him off, I held in tears because I didn't want him to see me cry.  Yesterday, I noticed the quietness in the afternoon.   Then today it totally hit me.  This was the first day that I had two and a half hours to myself (I had to pick up Simone early the first two days because they wanted to ease in the 2 year olds) and I just got sad.

I stopped working when I had Samuel and it has just been me and the kids.  Now one part of my parenting time has ended.  Now he spends more time at school and in activities then he does with me.  I know it will get easier, but I think it may be more of an adjustment for me then it is for him.

Now I have to figure out what my new schedule is going to be.  I need to figure out when I am going to fit in exercising, laundry, grocery shopping, cleaning, organizing, writing, volunteering, etc.  It is amazing how quickly two and a half hours go.  Today I ran four errands all around town and finished in one hour.  It was amazing how quickly I got things done.  My goal for the next few weeks it to finally have time to go through the house and clean up all the clutter.  I need to organize toys and go through stacks of mail, catalogs and everything.

Right now I am just trying to go with the flow.  I have learned that I am not very good with change and this is going to take some time to get used to.