Back to School

The kids went back to school in the middle of August. Hallee and Wyatt started at the new school, Shoreline Middle School.  Wyatt was sad that they didn't have a 7th grader day where he would get to stay home because the school is new to all of them. 

Hallee was nervous to start middle school.  She has been in Trinity's class every year since first grade and they didn't have any classes together, they don't even have lunch together.

Hallee was excited for her classes. She has a full year of choir and dance.  

Wyatt is not a fan of school. He tells me all the time that it is ruining his mental health, ha!

He is also not a fan of me taking his picture.

I love that they are only a year apart in school and are in middle school together. I think it helped Hallee to have Wyatt there to show her the ropes for the first few days.  

I might have followed them for a minute on their way to the bus stop to snap a few more pictures.  Wyatt gave me the look that told me it was time to go back home and let them go, ha! My work schedule is great because I get them off to school before I leave for work. It's nice because I feel like I have some quality time with them in the morning. I sit in the front room and straighten my hair while they eat breakfast.  They are usually pretty chatty in the morning, so it's nice I have that time with them.

I worried all day about Hallee and hoped she was having a good day.  She came home happy and said she had a great day.  She has friends in a lot of her classes and eats lunch with Alicia. I was worried about lunch because she is in second lunch which is mostly 8th graders because she has dance 4th period.  Hallee has become friends with Alicia in young women's and she is in her dance class, so they go to lunch together and eat lunch together. 

I had to take another picture on the second day because she looked so cute. Hallee is enjoying school and is excited that she is making new friends and enjoying her classes.  She has hard classes so she has a lot of homework.  The homework overwhelms her sometimes, but she is doing great.  I'm so grateful!

Jonah only has one class on A days. He has student government 2nd period and parent release the rest of the day.  He has a full day on B days. He still loves high school.  He doesn't necessarily love the classes, but he loves the social aspect and all the fun activities that come along with high school. He has had Keith's car to drive around while Keith has been out of work, so that has been hard for him.  We can drop him off on his full days, but the day he doesn't have a 1st period we are both at work so he has to walk to school.  I know it's so hard for him to be dropped off all the time now instead of being able to take himself, but he doesn't complain. It is really hard to get everyone where they need to be while Keith is at work. We all miss that extra car! 

I can't believe Jonah is a senior and will be eighteen next week.  This is going to be a great year for him.

We had to say goodbye to Caitlyn at the end of August.  Look at my beautiful girls! Luckily Hallee has adjusted, and this goodbye was not as hard as last year.  She is anxious for Caitlyn to come home and visit though.

It was a relief to have easier goodbyes this time.

Keith and I drove out to Cedar City with Caitlyn. I drove with Caitlyn and Keith drove the van. I loved having that time to visit with her.  I feel like we haven't had a ton of time together this summer because either she was at work or I was. Caitlyn is in a new apartment this year.  It was so much better moving in.  We backed the van right up to her door and unloaded in no time. It was much easier since she was on the ground floor!

She is in an apartment with 3 other girls, very different from 10 last year. 

She is excited to have her own room.  Blakely is in her apartment and then there are two girls she didn't know who share a room.  She likes her roommates a lot!

We helped her get moved in and then took her to dinner and to Walmart.  She was starting to feel nervous and it was hard to say goodbye.  It was so much better than last year though, but it will never be easy to say goodbye to my kids.

Amarie lives really close to Caitlyn.  They were planning on getting together after we left and that made me feel better about leaving Caitlyn.

Caitlyn sent me these pictures of them. I'm so glad they have each other down there. Caitlyn is enjoying being back at school.  She struggles with her classes and is always overwhelmed with all the homework and memorizing she has to do. Nursing is not an easy degree.  This semester she has Medical Anatomy and Chemistry and they are both so hard.  She keeps plugging along though and she is doing much better than she realizes! We sure miss her though!