Yesterday was Miss’s last day of preschool.
Recently, my husband and I decided that we would take her out of preschool and just start our homeschooling journey with her now. It was a little hard to make the decision to take her out, but only because I really love her school. It’s such a wonderful little place and her teachers are fantastic. When my husband and I decided in May that we will be homeschooling our girls, I thought that I would want to keep Miss in Preschool until the time for her to start Kindergarten (and send Lass and Sis when they got old enough). My reasoning for this was that she enjoys school and could have some good experiences in a fun learning environment that is more under my control than regular school would be beyond the preschool years. I could choose to send her only two mornings a week. I could choose the days she goes (LOVE this about her school). I could take her out of school to travel whenever necessary.
Additionally, her school is small, with mixed age groups and a really wonderful environment. It’s a mix of Montessori and traditional preschool styles that I think is really great. And I know of at least one instance when the owner of the school, after trying really hard to help a disruptive child, decided that the child could no longer attend because of the disruptions to the other kids. It’s not that I loved the idea that a child was asked to leave her school, but I was super glad that it was an option for her teachers to remove a child who was causing problems, when attempts at correcting the issues were unsuccessful. That would never happen in many other school settings.
I have always felt comfortable with and confident about Miss’s preschool, and at the time it seemed like the right thing to send her back at the start of this school year.
Problem is, her school is about 25 minutes from our house, and this fall juggling the younger two girls while getting her to school just seemed like more than I wanted to do. Sis’s schedule tends to get screwed up on school days. I never had as much time to run errands and get things done while Miss was at school as I thought I would.
Plus, I just want her home with me.
So I decided she would be done with school at the end of October. I talked with her about this, and she was fine with it. Her last day was the school’s Halloween party. It was a fun way to close out her preschool experience. All of us girls were in attendance.
Miss was super excited to show Lass her school.
I love seeing how much their relationship has grown just since last school year. The last time I had Lass at Miss’s school she seemed so much younger than the kids there. This time she fit right in.
They are the best of friends. I can’t wait to see how they grow together now that we’ll be starting “preschool” at our house.
And speaking of growing, our littlest ballerina is getting ready to move.
I’m so not ready for mobility.
Her first Halloween was lots of fun. She snuggled right in to go Trick or Treating with her big sisters. Or as Lass says, “Trick or Tricking”
It was pretty chilly last night, so we kept asking them if they wanted their hoods up. Miss said, “Nope. I like to feel the breeze in my hair.”
They were a little bit shy at the first house we visited.
But after that they were such funny, outgoing little trick or treaters. They actually stepped right into the second house on our route!
We did a quick sweep of our little neighborhood and rushed home to get into jammies and hit the road.
We’re at the Farm for the next week and a half for deer hunting.
It will be our first week of home preschool, and we’re going freestyle.
Tonight we watched five deer out the window. We talked all about does vs. bucks and had a cool experience when Miss banged on the window and the buck on the lawn looked right up at her. She was excited when I explained that he had heard her and was trying to figure out what the noise was. We watched him run off a few minutes later.
I haven’t yet decided if I’m going to actually get a preschool curriculum or just go with some of the things that are easily available online, some of the stuff that Miss did at her school, and lots of playing. I’m leaning towards the latter. I’m a little bit nervous about “doing it right,” but I think we’ll be okay.
I’m excited about having my oldest girl home with me full time again.
