Tomorrow morning at 7:45 Kiki will board the bus for her first day at Junior High. This is the 7th grade orientation day provided to give the new kids a chance to figure things out without 8th and 9th graders around. She claims not to be nervous. This is a good thing. I am nervous. I can tell because I keep wanting to corner Kiki and have talks about teasing and peer pressure and such. I’m restraining myself. I doubt she’ll encounter the worst that junior high has to offer on her first day there. There will be time to cover these subjects later. In fact, we’ve already covered most of these topics before. Me cornering her today will only pass my nervousness on to her without increasing her share of useful information. I need to let her be excited and cheerful. She’s either equipped to handle whatever Junior High throws her way, or she isn’t. I think she’ll be fine. She’s smart and pretty and confident. The winds of peer pressure seem to blow right over her without touching her in the slightest.
Tuesday morning at 8:00 Gleek will walk into her first grade classroom. At the same time Link will walk into his 4th grade classroom. 1st and 4th are both transition grades. The adjustments here are bigger. I think they are both ready. I think it will go well. A week from Tuesday at 9:30 Patches will be off for his first day of preschool.
All of my kids are setting out on voyages that they are variously prepared for. I hope none of them hit stormy weather before they get a chance to start sailing.