I officially have a high schooler in the house!!!
Ethan’s first day of school was yesterday, though it was technically just an “orientation day”. They had a full day of getting school ID pictures taken, receiving their Chromebooks, a school tour (led by upperclassmen), and then they went through an abbreviated day with 15-20 minutes in each class, basically just to meet the teachers.
After school he went straight to soccer tryouts, which apparently included a fairly grueling workout in the weight room, first.
We then met him at school a little before 6:00 for the New Student Induction Ceremony, which is the school’s historical tradition and big official welcome to the school’s community. It was very, very nice! Gave me all the warm fuzzies and lots of good vibes that this school is indeed the right place for him.
By the time all was said and done, including a quick dinner stop off after, we didn’t get home until close to 8 pm. A looooong first day!! (He got picked up at 7 a.m. sharp.) But, he had all good things to say and seemed very positive about the entire experience so far. Yay!
Today, Day 2, was his first “real” day of classes.
Because it rained yesterday and I couldn’t do our typical “stand in front of the front door” pose, I made him do a repeat today. It was also a dress-up day today, so, bonus. 😉 (Normally he’ll just wear regular clothes- no uniforms, etc. But they have occasional liturgy days which require dress up attire.)
On my end, I have been semi-frantically texting and chatting and calling with a few other moms sketching out somewhat complicated carpool schedules. I think we have a pretty good system worked out where…. and I’m going to say this very, very quietly, lest I jinx myself….I am currently not actually scheduled to personally drive AT ALL.
I know. A Christmas miracle!!!
But one dad works over on that side of town, as does Ivan, so, let’s let the men do the heavy lifting. We moms already gave birth to these kids; the least the dads can do is handle the carpool. 😂
In seriousness, it just makes sense. Not only from a time standpoint, but also from a GAS standpoint. It may get trickier once soccer ends and pick up times change, but, we’ll cross that bridge later.
(And a small, possibly insane part of me feels oddly “sad” about not having any days where I’ll be part of the drop-off/ pick-up process! I know, I know, that’s nuts. But it is nice in a way to get that glimpse into his whole school routine, car conversation, etc., and I have always been the primary “school parent” at our house over the years. I’m not actually worried though; I am sure plenty of opportunities will arise.)
A list of changes
I was just brainstorming various changes coming our way this fall. Life, it’s always changing, isn’t it:
Ethan
- Obvious one: just being in HIGH SCHOOL= increased class load/ work, higher stakes, etc!
- Going to school 25-30 minutes away from home. I already warned him- I cannot and will not “run something to school” if he forgets it…
- A lot more independence for him. No more “standard meal of the day” for lunch; he gets to select items from the cafeteria. Small but exciting change. Also- access to vending machines! haha.
- swiping his student ID on his way into each class. This is how they track attendance and tardies, etc. If your child doesn’t show up for any period, the system automatically sends the parents a notification via the school app. (Not that I am worried about him cutting class; not at all! But it’s kind of nice to see his daily schedule and whereabouts right on my phone.)
- changing classrooms all throughout the day! Many middle schools do this too, but at his middle school they only kind of did; they stuck with their same “homeroom” group of kids mostly all day for all classes. Now he will go off in different directions every period, with different kids and different teachers in every class.
- High school soccer in the fall (and tennis in the spring). Practice every day from 3:45-6:00/6:30, riding to games on busses, the whole camaraderie that comes with representing your school and wearing the matching sweatshirts, yada yada. 🙂 Getting home at 6:30-7 pm or later most nights will also be a HUGE change.
- Hopefully new friends. 🙂
Asher
- Not as many for him, but he’s joined a new soccer club this fall. So that will be different.
- Also, he decided to not return to the school cross-country team. He learned his lesson the hard way last year; doing cross-country, swim team and soccer all at the same time was not feasible.
- No longer having his big brother at school with him anymore! Neither one seems to actually care about this, but still. They have come and gone on the same bus for years now. Different schools is new!
All in all, so far, so good. We’re entering a new phase, but we’ve tackled every other phase that has come up thus far in parenting, and we’re still standing. 🙂
GRATEFUL KAE 
Wow! This is all so exciting, Kae and your boys just seem like THE MOST DELIGHTFUL kids ever. And Ethan looks so grown up in that Grade 9 photo. Wow time flies. That will be me in just 2 Septembers – GAH.
Also, this made me laugh: “We moms already gave birth to these kids; the least the dads can do is handle the carpool.”
I use this line on my husband all. the. time. Well, I birthed them, so you can do X.
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Thank you!! They are mostly delightful. 😉 And yes, I know it’s SO cliche, but it really does somehow fly by…. It will be Abby’s turn in a blink of an eye.
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glad to hear the first two days went well and he’s happy about the new school. Congrats on avoiding having to drive him. We are always facing changes as Sofia will have 4 times swim practice in the other campus (25 min away vs. 5 min away). she’ll also get home late for 3 days on weekdays so our evening routine will change. I’m super excited though. They feel so big now, right?
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Yes, new school year, new routines, new activities…. so many things, but I agree- it really is exciting! It’s fun to move into these new stages. 🙂
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Yay for high school! What a fun time of life. Both my boys loved it, and I did too, back in the 90s!
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I really hope he loves it, too! I have so many great memories from those years, too. I feel he doesn’t quite have the same draw to an active social life as I did back then, hanging out with my girlfriends, etc….so sometimes I worry he will somehow “miss out” on things. But my husband reminds me that he is his OWN person, not a mini-me, and he may not want/desire the same things I did at that age. So I am trying to remember this. 🙂
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Wow! I’m so interested to hear people say they had a good time in high school. I don’t know if I’ve ever met a real-life person who would say that. LOL. I would 100% go back and do my college years again, but high school? Hard pass.
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Wow, Ethan starts a full two weeks before Asher? That is interesting! Most of the schools here started last week, but they started on Thursday, which seems strange to me. Actually it seems strange to start so early period, as we always started after Labor day and the elementary and high school started on the same day (we did not have middle school)!
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Yes, I’m not sure actually why Ethan’s school starts so early… they do end earlier then in the spring too, and I think they have a longer break over Christmas as well. I am sure it all evens out!!
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AWWWW! High school! Ethan looks so grown up and handsome. The first day orientation sounds intense though, but it can be really nice to have some pomp and circumstance, especially when it’s a big transition like this one!
I love the list of things that he’ll get to do at high school too!
Haha – Asher is sleeping in for two more weeks! That is hilarious. Live it up!
I totally understand the mixed feelings about not doing the school drop off/pick up. It can be such a good time to get tidbits about what’s going on in the kids’ minds and lives! But also, what a time saver to have someone else handle it!
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Thanks! He did look cute. 🙂 For soccer game days apparently the boys all dress up in khakis, a white shirt and then a maroon and gold striped tie to match their school colors. Haha. So he’s looking forward to that, too. 😉
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Ethan looks so handsome! It’s nice to feel so good about the place you are sending your kids. We feel really good about Paul’s elementary school. The principal seems awesome and we’ve heard such good things. I am ready for Taco to move to the new daycare. Drops off have been rough all summer since Paul isn’t there with him. Changing daycares doesn’t solve that problem, but I know he’s had a hard time with the change in teachers. He changed rooms and then both of the teachers in that room were going to leave but they must have talked one into staying but shifted her to a different classroom. So overall, it’s been a lot of change/instability and I’m so over it.
That is awesome you don’t have to do carpool! Yes – let the guys cover it! Before my trip to Canada, I was at a bbq and commented on my guilt about leaving the kids again and another mom said: “well did your husband grow your children’s bones?” Hee hee. Phil came over to chime in on the convo and I just emphasized that he has done a lot of solo parenting when I travel for work and she was like – ‘again, did you grow their bones?’ She was doing it in a funny/kind way, but it can be easy to forget that we’ve done a lot of sacrificing for our kids. I had 2 really awful pregnancies with the boys, pumped for 10 months for Paul and nursed Will for 16 months. So I did “put in my time” in terms of not ideal circumstances. 😉
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Haha about the mom and her comments! It’s true- there are certain arguments guys just can’t win. 😉
And yes, it really is a huge relief to feel comfortable with your school. Ethan had attended our local public school from K-4 and it was just generally an overall disaster for him. I was so anxious and stressed all the time about it, that when we FINALLY made the decision to pull him out (which was a hard decision!!) and their new school was great, I was like phewwwww. Huge sigh of relief. It’s something that people can’t really understand until they’ve lived it. I know there may be eye rolling about public vs private schools, but when it comes to your kid, you have to do what is best for them. We certainly tried the public school! And I went to public school my whole life, and my mom was a special ed public school teacher in downtown Milwaukee. In fact, we gave it longer than we should have with the boys; I never intended to do private school when we had kids. (We didn’t pull him out until November of his 4th grade, mid-year.) But you just don’t know what a situation will be like sometimes until you’re in it and living it first hand. When serious issues arise, you have to do something. That’s why I find it upsetting when people make judgmental comments about people who choose private school. There may be more to the story than what they know.
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Yes only you and your partner know what is best for your kids! You tried public school and the setting didn’t work for him! I am glad we proceeded with the decision to move Taco. It wasn’t an easy decision as we love the teachers and other families but the level of instability was unacceptable. I was ready to move him before Phil was who was more apt to give them a bit of time to work through some of the things that were going on. But we had set up a tour of another daycare in the area preemptively just to have a back-up plan in case things didn’t improve. And then both of his teachers resigned and I was like – I AM SO DONE. Another mom told me that they hemmed and hawed about changing daycares for quite awhile but thought the change would be worse than what we going on at the center. She said she totally regretted not moving her son sooner. Originally we were going to move Taco on Sept 11th so we could get through Paul’s K transition first but then we moved it up to 8/28 and I am so glad we did. We have to give a 4 week notice at our daycare – otherwise I probably would have already moved him!
A lot of families that live in Minneapolis have opted to leave our public school district – they either move to the suburbs or send their kids to private school or a charter school. The pandemic was really hard on families since public schools were more conservative with return to school policies. Which I get – everyone was doing their best with the information they had. But then this past spring the teachers striked and there was no school for like 12 days or something and that was kind of the last straw for a lot of families. That kind of strike hasn’t happened in 20 years so hopefully we won’t go through that as it would be so stressful with 2 working parents!! I guess the silver lining is that class sizes have really declined due to enrollment being down. So they were expecting a class size of 22 for Paul’s K grade – down from 28 the previous year! But all these decisions about education are so very personal and shouldn’t be judged by others who don’t know what factors went into your decision!
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What a nice first day! So for the induction ceremony- do they walk into the school through the special doors, and then walk OUT the doors when they graduate? Did you have a momentary “flash forward” of him walking back
out the doors in four years? Or is that just the way my mind works these days?
I’m impressed that he has soccer practice EVERY SINGLE DAY. Neither of my kids is into sports, so I don’t know about these things. My daughter will be staying after school for band one or two days a week (depending on what time of year it is) but every day… that’s hard core.
I get the mixed feelings about the carpool situation. My first thought was, “you are SO lucky!” But it’s true- those car rides can be quality time. In the mornings when traffic has been so terrible, I try to tell myself, “more traffic, more time to talk!”
I LOVE the first day of school photo!
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Well, I should clarify- the soccer practice thing is every day there isn’t a game. And apparently most of their games occur Tuesdays and/or Thursdays. So I think it will really only be 3-4 practices per week, plus games on the other days!
And yes, I kind of did have a moment of envisioning him all finished up! In one the speeches at the ceremony (given by a parent of older kids), he said something to the kids like, Welcome! Only 44 months to do. And I was like, whoa, 44 months doesn’t sound that long!
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What an exciting new stage; and one that sounds like it will go so well with that kind of kickoff. 🙂 I feel similarly about each new stage as you do to carpool- like hooray they can do it without me, and also, sniffle, I’m not involved. The bittersweetness of motherhood I suppose 🙂
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Haha, I know! And the other side to this issue is that I know my husband would not even think twice about if he’s part of the carpool or not. Haha. He IS part of the carpool but I have a feeling he’d be just as happy to not be. 😆😆 But we moms… always overthinking things…. haha.
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When I read this, I realize how very different the highschool experience in this country is. My highschool was a 5 minute walk from my house LOL there was no cafeteria at the time, no student ID’s and no picture days LOL
Congrats on having a high schooler in the house.
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