Squeezing Tears from a Stone

*First an update: Adaleine is doing so well with her burns! They are healing really well and no skin grafts! Yay! Just thought you'd like to know : )*

Well, it’s official. My babies are growing up. I almost cried last night, and I do not believe in tears. Let me tell you how it all went down.

Eden is starting kindergarten tomorrow. Last night was the open house for her and all the other kids at her school to go see their classrooms, locate their cubbies, and find where they’ll be sitting. Nope. It’s not what you’re thinking. I’m not at all emotional about that. You have to remember who you’re talking to here. I’m dead inside—remember??

So there we are, unloading all of her school supplies and such. When we find her cubby I see a small Ziploc baggie sitting there on the shelf. I take a quick look at it, see that it’s for parents, and shove it in my giant bag purse. We do our little exploration and then head into the gym for ice cream and socializing. As I sat at the table watching both of my daughters get ice cream sandwich all over their hands, I remembered the baggy. “I’ll just check that out now. Maybe there’re instructions in there for school or something.” That was my first mistake. I should never have even looked.

A Kleenex: harmless enough. A cotton ball: weird but no big deal. Tea—wait a second. Are these people suggesting I might be emotional? Don’t they know I’m dead inside? And then I read the dang note. In case you can’t make out what it says from the picture, here it is.

Dear Parents,

Thank you for entrusting your child to me. I promise to do my best everyday to be your child’s companion in learning. After you have wiped your tears, make yourself a nice warm cup of tea. Put your feet up and relax. Then hold the cotton ball in your hand. The softness will remind you of the gentle spirit of your child. (This is where the words started blurring for some completely unexplained reason) I will work alongside you this year to help your child grow not only academically but in their walk with Jesus.

It was the gentle spirit part that got me. My sweet little Eden is very sensitive. Bossy? Yes. Mean to her sister sometimes? Absolutely. But she can get her heart hurt by the other kids in her class. I saw glimpses of it a couple of times in preschool. Ouch. That’s the only thing I’m worried about—her getting her little sensitive heart stepped on. Those teachers better be watching : )

But back to last night. To add insult to injury Adaleine decided to grow up on me too. What I’m about to tell you may seem silly to you. I think it seemed silly to Mr. Bug. But here goes. Adaleine has decided to go by a nickname. I know, right?? She can’t just do that can she?! I think I’ve been in denial for a while because I’ve seen the signs. But it was too concrete last night to ignore.

We wandered into her preschool room and asked her teacher where her cubby would be when she starts school on Thursday. As we were looking at all the names, I started to feel a little uneasy because I couldn’t see an ‘Adaleine’ tag anywhere. Then I saw it. Ada. And she was so excited. My mind flashed back to her response to her teacher’s “What do you want to be called?” question.

My little Adaleine Grace is Ada now. I have to say this was the first determined act of individuality I have ever seen from this little girl. And it seems so…final. This will be what all her friends grow up calling her. From here on out it will just be her dumb old mom calling her Adaleine. This was actually harder on me than that stupid cotton ball stunt the teachers tried to pull. It’s like they had it in for me last night!

So to sum up: I have no problem with Eden starting kindergarten and getting older and being away from the house for the entire day. I am only worried about some of those other stinking kids making her sad. And I’m super excited for Adaleine to be in preschool. I’m just sad that she’s getting mature enough to decide she wants to go by a nickname. I realize it’s all unreasonable, but I’m a mom. I can be unreasonable if I want to.

*Note: When I ran spell check on this post it flagged ‘Ada’ and I had to add it to the dictionary. That was just rude*