We have had a few ups and downs with friendships as they all found their place within the class and assessed each others' friendship potential. Holly seems to have navigated towards the girl clique, which I am slightly wary of, having had a lot of trouble with girls when I was in school. It's hard not to project your own experiences onto your children, but I am aware that this is her turn and her choices and I have to respect that and guide her as I can. There was some trouble in the beginning with tales of 'you're not coming to my party' and 'you can't play here' but her teacher is excellent and nipped it in the bud immediately, and it all looks to have subsided.
The homework hasn't been too much, which I am quite relieved of as I do feel children get so much pressure on them so young and I'd like to hold off from that as long as we can. I am fortunate in that Holly is very academic and has always loved writing and prefers to sit and focus on one task for a while rather than running around causing mayhem. This has transferred to school really well and in her last parents' evening the teacher sang her praises. This has also meant I don't have to worry about forcing her to do her reading or her words as she happily does it on her own and is more than capable. I'm confident it won't be the same story with her brother in September, however!
As for the morning routine, this has been a killer for me and definitely something we've had to adapt to. We've now got it down to a fine art which consists of forty five minutes to get dressed, have breakfast, brush teeth, brush hair, shoes and coats on and out the door! Of course it never runs as smoothly as it sounds and I'm usually frantically trying to get Jack's coat on as he insists on undoing his shoes whilst Holly is complaining she has breakfast down her clean pinafore and I've yet to brush my hair! Needless to say it's not my favourite part of the day.
All in all though, the month of starting school for all of us has gone as well as to be expected. Holly has grown up so much in these last six months, it is alarming how fast her childhood is going. Soon she will be coming downstairs in skinny jeans and stealing make up, whilst her dad tells her she's not going out dressed like that - cripes!
