School Starts Tomorrow!

At the end of the school year last Spring the teachers sent us home with instructions:

Have your child practice his/her multiplication tables.
Have your in-coming kindergartener practice writing her name over and over until she can do it in the lines with a capital letter for the first letter and small letters for the other letters.
Read to your child everyday.
Fill out a reading chart with all of the books your child read over the summer.
Review math concepts learned last year... and so on.

Well, we were just SO BUSY that we didn't get any of those things done. OOPS. In the meantime, our boys were able to find hours upon hours in which to play with their friends. They had time to play video, computer, or the Wii. Janika found time to chat with all of her friends over facebook (and to her credit she read several huge books cover over the summer). And the big kids did manage to watch a movie almost every night after the little kids were in bed. Our little kids always found time to play dress up, babies, and mermaids for hours on end. And all of the kids always found time to made nachos -- at any hour of the day or night.

Yeah, we were pretty lazy this summer. We really do place an emphasis on education and academics around here...at least nine months out of the year. And the beginning of that nine months starts tomorrow. No more staying up late watching movies every night, no more sleeping in, no more hours of unstructured activities. And no more helping mom out with baby-sitting, chores, doing girls' hair, laundry, and cooking during the day. Boo hoo!

But a little structure is always nice too. And good teachers to help mold and teach young minds -- and resources to expand learning and increase social development. And new activities, new friends, and new ideas. And a couple of hours of quiet time for mom (hopefully). Hooray for school!