Thankful Thursday 52/First Day of School

So thankful for a phenomenal first day of school.
We have been anticipating this day for quite some time now- even more so than in years past.

School is always an adventure, but because of the changes we have made in how we are doing our schooling, we were a bundle of excitement, nerves, joy and sadness.

My Sophomore

(don't mind the silly smiley face...I just don't feel comfortable showing a picture of my house number for all to see.  Feels weird.)

With the new adventure for the girls, I feel like Josh going to high school kind of snuck up on me.  If I really would have been thinking, I may have shed a tear or two...but I was so preoccupied in making sure that the girls' day was successful, I really did not have time to be sad.

Who has any reason to be sad when your kiddo is so excited and ready to begin this new phase in life?

Ok, so he wasn't jumping up and down in an excited frenzy, but the twinkle in his eye told me that he was kind of looking forward to this day.

And apparently he has decided that the Piano Guys shirt will be his first and last day of school shirt from now on.  I told him he better stop growing or he might have a belly shirt by the end of the school year....

Now for the girlies

There was definitely excitement brewing here.

We weren't sure what to expect or how things would go, but we wanted to make sure we looked nice.  After all, it is the first day of school.

(Can I just say that Ellie's sense of style is one in a million and I love it.)

The excitement quickly turned into silliness (for the elementary girls anyway.  Emma is much too mature now as a middle schooler to participate in such shenanigans. ;)

Oh, who are we kidding.

We didn't stay in those clothes!

We did school at home today!

Break out the comfy clothes!

And the silliness continued....

and then turned into somewhat of a meltdown, which I sort of expected to happen, but I still found myself saying, "What in the world have I done?"

Fortunately after some deep breathing and a few words spoken probably a little too loudly, we hugged and kissed and moved on with our school day.

It was a super fun school day.

Bailey even got into the action.  :)

I know it will take us a few weeks to get into a good groove and establish a schedule that works, but I am feeling really good about this decision.

I am loving what I have seen from the curriculum so far and the teachers are really great.

We attended a couple of Back to School events earlier this week and it was a fun- although different experience.

(I forgot to take a picture of Emma.  Oops.)

This year will definitely be different.

Today we were filled with mixed emotions.

It was really weird not being at the elementary school today.

I love that school.

My kids love that school.

I missed seeing all of my friends there today.
My girls missed their friends a little bit too.

I have really felt like a rebel of sorts this week and I think that will continue as the school year goes on.  Especially when we are out and about and my kids will get the question, 

"Why aren't you in school today?"
Not going to a traditional school is really weird to some people,

but we are solid in the fact that we know this is what is best for our family at this time, for this school year.  It is a huge leap of faith for all of us.

But I think we are leaping into something really great.