School!

On Thursday I made an impulse call to a charter school out in Silverton, about 1/8m up the road from mom and dad's house. I was feeling really uneasy about starting Keira at the charter school that she was enrolled in. We had been in there on Tuesday and that feeling still hadn't gone away, even after going in. If anything it was worse/stronger. Last spring my original plan had been to apply to both and if she got into Bethany-the one in Silverton-then we'd take that one for sure, even if she got a spot at Baker here in Salem. Then I got lazy, she got a spot in Baker before the application time for Bethany even opened, so I didn't bother. Mostly I figured that there wouldn't be any room since there were only 15 spots open, and preference is given to siblings of already enrolled students, and then to kids that live in that school district before opening up to the likes of us.

So I called Tuesday morning @ 9:15. They had ONE spot left and if I could be there in 35 minutes for a tour and interview with the principal, I could have it. I literally was in a towel out of the shower when I made the call. But we made it, barely! I loved it. The principal knows every single kiddo by name-she even already knows Scharae's name! She reminds me of my principal Mrs Thompson at Custer when I was growing up. The school is small. It's K-8 so no worries about transitioning to middle school. Most the schools in Silver Falls School District are K-8, so she also won't be a minority at high school as far as never having been to middle school. And if she goes through 8th grade here then she's pretty much guaranteed a spot in the high school, even if we haven't managed to move out there yet.

How weird is it to already be anticipating high school? I guess not that weird. This whole school thing should have been on our minds when we bought the house...in which case we would not have bought where we did! With any luck we'll be moved to Silverton by then, though.

So, K's there at Bethany Charter, which left my Mondays and Wednesdays going something like this:

7:20 leave to get Keira to school before 7:45
9:15 be back into Salem to get Scharae to preschool
11:30 be back to Silverton to get Keira from Kindergarten
12:00 back to Salem to get Scharae from preschool.

That's a lot of driving. So I fudged things a bit and told the preschool that we are moving to Silverton. Scharae will start preschool out there in Silverton on the 29th and we're working on getting her a bus to take her from preschool to Nana's because she gets out at 11:30 and if there's anything I've figured out as a mom, it's that no matter now many other things I manage to cram into life, I cannot be in two places at the same time. And school is not the time to try it out...I do not want my girls to be the ones left waiting for a mom that is chronically late :( So, this will have to work. And bless my mom's heart, she is willing to pick Keira up from school here and there if she's available and I need her to!

Keira says she loves school. She's still working on learning all the girls' names. I think there are only 4 or 5, including her. She gets to choose milk, chocolate milk, or juice every morning when she marks herself as present. Oh yeah, forgot to mention-the classroom has a smart board. Every classroom does, including the kindergarten one! And the kiddos mark the roll themselves! I prepaid a few months of daily drinks for her. My intent was to send a water bottle and tell her that water was what she drank at school. But the reality is that she drinks water most other times of the day, so what harm is chocolate milk or juice? She prefers the juice because it's easier for her to drink it all. She rarely makes it through a whole thing of milk, even though they're tiny. She is seeming to really do well, and I think the small class has a lot to do with that!

Scharae...she got in an argument with her teacher on the first day. I had told S that she was probably going to only go to this classroom for 2 days and then when we come back from Branson she would go to a new one. So she told her teacher that she was only going to come 2 days. And I'm sure the teacher thought she meant 2 days of school period. So she told her that she'd go 2 days and then she'd go the next Monday and Wednesday for another 2 days and that she'd do that every week. I guess Scharae got a bit heated with her about only going 2 days! We got it all sorted out in the end, though! She's a feisty little one!