Preparing for a New Routine

This week starts a new phase in our family's lives: Corban will start kindergarten! Tomorrow is an orientation day and then Corban's first full day will be Thursday. I have been in denial all summer. Seriously. It hit me hard yesterday and I was weepy all day long. I tried not to let Corban see me, but he would walk out of the room and there would go the tears. Corban has been with me through so much. I had so many doctors appointments, especially with Sydney and Jared and Corban was always the kid you could bring along because he sat so good and was so well behaved. He's my buddy and he has always gone almost everywhere with me.

Last night he told Mike, "Dad, mom's going to need a lot of help when I'm at school. I think you will need to help her." How sweet of Corban to think of me. He is my big helper. I keep telling him how proud I am of him and how excited I am for him. Really, I am. He is so ready. It's me that's not entirely ready. I'm sure I was just holding him in the hospital!

For weeks now Mike has been asking me to start getting us on a schedule that would help us get up earlier for school. Whenever I have tried to get up earlier than the kids they always end up hearing me (our bedroom doors are all really close to each other) and wake up, so I gave up getting up any earlier than I have to a long time ago. Plus, I'm a bit of a night owl. So, I knew this change was coming and it might be one of the harder parts of school. I have been slowly setting my alarm clock earlier for the last week or so, hoping that would help. It has, some. Yesterday one of my friends did a trial run to see if they could be up and ready for school on time and the goal was to be at Dunkin' Donuts at the time school starts. I thought that was a terrific idea! However, we don't have a DD close by. So, what do the Sommers do? Go to McDonald's, of course! =) And, we made it! I even got a load of laundry in before we left. Actually, we were there about 20 minutes earlier than school starts, but I wanted to make sure we would have enough time to eat breakfast in the morning, too. It was really fun to sit there and eat out with my kids. They really behaved well and it was so fun to do something so out of our usual routine with them. Of course, we saw a lot of people we know. Corban said, "Man, everyone is at McDonald's in the morning!" The kids didn't know what they were missing!

The biggest surprise of all? Their cousin Chase was there with his dad! Chase's school starts just a bit later than his older brother and sister's school, so Wendell took him to McDonald's for breakfast on his first day of school. How sweet. Corban totally looks up to Chase and his brother Riley, so he was especially excited to get to see him this morning. What a treat!