"Bye Bye Mommy!"

Owen's preschool started 4 weeks ago. It's the same program that I did for him in the Spring. It runs for 10 weeks and is 1 hour a day, twice a week. Just enough for him right now.

For the first 3 weeks the mere sight of pulling into the parking lot would start him crying and carrying on. That slowly got better and the crying and hysterics wouldn't start until I dropped him off at the classroom. That got somewhat better. Then, there was today.

We pulled into the parking lot of the recreation center, and he's not crying or carrying on. I unbuckle his seat belt and he climbs right down out of the car. I got Caroline out of the car and we all proceed to walk in together. We turned down the hallway and there's no anxiety anywhere on his face or in his behavior. We walked straight into the classroom. He sees one of his teachers, his favorite - Ms. Debra, and he ran to give her a great big hug. I signed him in talked to Ms. Debra and proceeded to walk out.

When Caroline and I get to the door I hear this little voice call out behind me:

Owen: "Bye bye Mommy!"

Me: "Bye Onie B."

Owen: "You're going home?"

Me: "No, but I'll be back."

Owen: "Okay. Bye bye Mommy! Awaaaaaaaaah! (blowing me kisses)"

Me & Caroline: "Awaaaaaaaaah!"

I couldn't believe in such a short amount of time he would be comfortable already in his class. I didn't like him hanging on me every other time I dropped him off and that was more than frustrating. Today was nice that I didn't have the battle, but it completely caught me by surprise that it left me wondering how is he going to do on the first day of kindergarten. I'll probably be a mess, and he'll be fine. Or maybe it'll be the other way around. Who knows? Just grateful, for the time being anyway, that I don't have to deal with that quite yet. Soon enough, but not yet.

Let's hope we have this same kind of a day tomorrow for his sports class. Dropping him off at that class has been even worse than this one. Here's to hoping......