Soccer mom

Well it’s official – I’m now a soccer mom. Ethan played twice last weekend, once in a game, and once in a practice (in that order). It was very cute to see 10 five year olds running around randomly, sometimes in relation to the ball, but often not. The concept that they were trying to get the ball to go in a particular direction was new to most of them. The idea that there was a boundary past which they weren’t supposed to kick the ball seemed incomprehensible to them. But they seemed to be enjoying themselves, which was the most important thing. And somehow Ethan knew how to stop and kick the ball, but I have no idea where he learned it from. A babysitter here? Where he was before? Ethan didn’t seem to know either.

We also went to a fun event this past weekend – called “Touch-a-Truck”. It was free, and I thought it was just wonderful that all these people would clean and bring their trucks to show them off. There were a lot of interesting ones, including an ambulance you could get in, a police mobile unit that you could walk through, and lots of huge trucks that Ethan could sit at the steering while and pretend to drive. Bob The Builder was there – the “real” one according to Ethan.

The other night Ethan was in a really weird mood before dinner. I was wondering what was up, and then after dinner he started asking us a slew of tough questions: Why did we pick him? Was he in somebody’s tummy? Did we want a kid? I knew the questions were coming at some point, I just wasn’t expecting them so soon! Now I have to do catch up to figure out helpful ways to answer them. Ever since he asked the questions he’s been in a great mood, so I think he’d been worried about some of these things. There’s a part of me that so wishes he didn’t have to deal with all this stuff!

First Day of Kindergarten!

Ethan started Kindergarten a couple of weeks ago! He was very excited to start, and so far things have been going very well. Here’s a photo of him getting on the bus with his dad the very first day. He sat next to his friend Nicholas, another incoming kindergartner who lives a couple doors down. I decided to bike down to the school to snap some photos of him getting off the bus. All the kids were so cute, and a little overwhelmed.

Ethan also started his after-school program, which he is thrilled about since his “best buddy” Cameron is in preschool in the next room and they get to see each other every day.

The first week of school was a little rough because Ethan was sick with a fever and cold. He was so excited to go to school that he managed to be well enough to make it, but he’d come home and just collapse. Then that weekend he managed to save up every negative thought, action, and word, and dump it on us, mostly on Saturday. In talking to other parents of kindergartners, it sounds like this was actually pretty much the norm. It’s pretty overwhelming to meet all the new people, adjust to new expectations, new routines, etc. This past week as a lot better.

The weekend before school started (Labor Day Weekend), we took a few day trips around town. We went to the Providence Zoo, where Ethan’s favorite animals were the short-legged donkey (because it reminded him of Donkey in Shrek), and the bison. Here’s a photo with Mark, and if you look closely you can see that Ethan’s mouth is still blue from the 2 foot long frozen popsicle thingy that he got to eat there.

We also took a trip down to see the swan boats in Boston. We had read “Make Way for Ducklings” the night before we went down there. Ethan mostly wanted to go see the real swans, but he had a fun time with the pretend swans as well.