School

Reality set in yesterday - big time! The reality is this: Ian starts school in exactly 4 weeks. Ahhhhhhhhhh! [Insert panic here.] I don't know why I've been ignoring this fact, but it hit me hard when I decided to get online to see if I could find out what time his school day started and ended. (9:25-3:55) Then I counted out the weeks on the calendar and I was like "holy crap - that time is going to fly!" I know how fast our weeks fly by and I know that August 25th will be here before I know it.

He isn't even registered for school yet. When I called to see what I had to do to get him registered I was told to call back at the beginning of August and I was also given a list of paperwork that I needed to get together in order to get him enrolled. Our situation is a little more complicated since we haven't actually moved into our new house yet, but it will be ready in mid-September. So, they're allowing him to start school in the new district as long as we have a letter from the builder giving the completion date of the house and a copy of the sales contract along with all of the other insane amount of paperwork that you need (copy of your electric bill, current lease, birth certificate, immunization records etc...) Well, I called the school district the middle of last week and the lady that I need to talk to was on vacation so I'm hoping to get everything squared away sometime this week.

While I was on the school's website checking out the school hours I also printed out a list of the school supplies that he'll need. I wasn't surprised by most things on the list - a backpack, pink eraser, pencils, crayons etc... There were a few things that did catch me off guard - supplies that I know I didn't need when I was a kid. Things like Ziploc bags, band-aids, Kleenex and paper plates. It seems like these were things that the school provided if they were needed. I don't know if the school budget is so tight that they need parents to provide these things or if they figure this is one way that they can get parents to be a little more invested in their kids education (Trevor's idea).

All of this started an interesting conversation between Trevor and myself last night. It dawned on us that we are entering a whole new world. The world of being parents of a school age child. What is this world like? We have friends who are parents of school aged kids so we've observed a little from the outside, but really we have no clue how our world is going to change come August 25th. We can guess and we can theorize about what kind of parents we're going to be, but in actuality we are completely clueless!

On one hand I'm looking forward to having Ian in school. I think he's going to thrive in that environment. But, on the other hand it's so daunting. Both Trevor and I want to be aware and involved in what he's learning at school, but we don't want to be one of those parents that hover over our kids and pressure them to excel not only in school, but in a bazillion extra curricular activities as well.

We want our kids to care about what matters most. Their faith, their family and their community. Education is important and extra curricular activities are good, but God comes first. If that means that they don't get straight A's or they aren't as well rounded as their classmates because they aren't in sports that's ok. At the same time we want them to grow up to learn valuable lessons - lessons that God wants them to learn through school. Lessons like self-discipline and playing well with others and respecting authority. We know that those lessons will come through getting good grades and being involved in extra-curricular activities. So, it's a really fine line that we're going to have to walk.

We appreciate your prayers and support as we enter this new era of parenting! It's exciting and daunting and we can't walk this road alone.

UPDATE: Ian is officially registered for school. The lady at the school district called me this morning and had me come in to start the process and then she sent me over to the school and we got it all done! Now he just has to go in on Wednesday for his kindergarten evaluation.