The 2017-2018 school year honestly felt like ten thousand years for all of us. When the kids started E was deployed, Finnegan had just turned one, and things were so crazy I barely remember the fall. The last 2 months have felt like an entirely new decade. I’m hoping summer doesn’t fly by too fast, we could all use a little laziness.

All three kids big kids ended the school year on high notes. Caroline won an award for best second grader (based both on behavior and grades), Evan won an award for musical achievement, and Lincoln got accepted to a full day pre-k program for next year, where he’ll continue to get speech services. They all adjusted to school well and are a tiny bit sad it’s over now, because they’ll miss their friends and fun stuff like music and recess during the summer. I will miss school breakfast and lunch, as well as the 2 hours of quiet every afternoon while Finn napped. But we have a ton of stuff on our calendar for the summer, plus plenty of lazy days to spend at the lake, so we are ready. Bring on the summer!

Previously: first day 2014, first day 2015, first day 2016

Three of my four children started school this week. The big kids were thrilled, as usual, because they love school. Caroline has the same teacher she had for kindergarten, who Evan also had for both kindergarten and second grade, so she’s pretty familiar with us Davises. Evan has a teacher we haven’t met before but both kids know her a little – one of the advantages of a small school – and she seems super nice. I am not worried about the big kids in the least.

Lincoln is going to preschool 5 days a week in the afternoons. He qualifies for early preschool because of his speech delay – he aged out of Birth to Three at-home sessions. That means he has an IEP and gets to meet with the school speech therapist every week, while also getting a head start on school. I mean, he’s not learning to read or anything, but he’s started to show interest in art and letters and counting, so I’m happy he has somewhere to focus on that.

Unfortunately, Lincoln does not like leaving me. It’s pretty much my own fault. He is not a shy kid. He is rarely scared. More often than not I have to keep him from killing himself because he has no sense of danger. He runs away in public and I have to chase him down. But he does all that stuff because he trusts me and knows I’m not far away. I almost never leave him anywhere, especially not with new adults he’s only met once or twice. And right now I’m his only parent, so he’s especially worried when I’m out of sight. The first two days of bus pick-up have been rough. When he comes home again he’s fine, so at least he isn’t spending 2.5 hours sobbing in a corner. I just need the pick-up part to get better next week.

The day the kids actually started first and second grade, I was in the hospital with baby #4, having given birth almost exactly 24 hours earlier. Luckily, before I went into the hospital, I forced them into school uniforms to take these pictures, because I figured faking it by 2 days is something they would forget pretty soon but if someday I put together a book of First Day photos and this year was missing they would notice. But because I faked them just a little, I only have a few and I didn’t get the shot of Linc crying because he didn’t get on the bus that I was sure I would end up with. Although from what the adults here at home reported, Linc slept through the whole thing and didn’t care in the slightest.

It’s a good thing I did have a baby this week, because THESE kids are clearly no longer babies and I need a baby fix. For comparison, here’s 2014 and 2015, where my children are much more appropriately sized and not these big kids who seem to have taken their place.