On the road again...

So this happened on September 18...Reed finished his behind the wheel sessions that day and got his temporary license. We will go finalize things in November, but meanwhile he's good to go. We sent him to pick up dinner in this picture. It's hard to send my baby out there on the road by himself!! He's still got some learning to do, but it will only come with more practice. One day last week I had to go to the office (GASP!) and he texted me to say he wanted to just go for a drive. What?! Well, okay then. And this past Saturday he got up and showered, and took Shelby over to Manassas Battlefield to go for a bit of a hike. Adding the X factor of a goofy dog in the car with no one to corral her was even more stressful to me. But I took a deep breath and said of course you can. And he was fine! This whole thing is very hard!

And then...

One day after she was eligible (only because we couldn't get an appointment for the actual day), Amy got her learner's permit. Tod has let her drive the Cube before, but I wasn't prepared to let her drive home. Instead I drove her to a school near our house and let her get some practice time in. She drove back to the house, though. Maybe this whole thing is getting a little easier?? No, not really. She is clearly much more eager to learn to drive than Reed was for so long. So I fully expect that she'll be getting her license the day she turns 16. I hope she'll learn where things are by then...she always has her nose in her phone when we're driving, so she's not paid a lot of attention to how to get places. Thank goodness for navigational apps!

Time is flying by!

Off we go!

It was Reed's last first day at LCPS. Only two more to go for Amy. 

Didn't we just send them off to kindergarten?!

We did our traditional "breakfast for dinner" the night before school started, and this year we even remembered to include both their grade AND their names (we forgot for the last THREE years!). [Note: we also finally got good at it – Tod realized I had extra squirt bottles leftover from tie dying projects, and those worked perfectly!]

Of course this isn't exactly a normal school year. The kids will be doing school from home at least through the first semester, which runs into January. Who knows if they'll be back in school after that....fingers crossed.

Since both kids already have their own computer desk area, fortunately we didn't need to do much to prepare for virtual learning. Reed has his basement lair, and Amy is ensconced in the formal living room. I continue to work in my upstairs office (that is really a bedroom).

Reed even spent part of the first day doing class from the back deck – why not, the weather was great!

They didn't run into any technical problems yet, so that's a plus! Amy is uneasy with participating in the interactive parts of class, but hopefully she'll take some deep breaths and just give it a whirl. The schedule is a little bit weird, they have Mondays to basically work on their own (and get help if it's needed), and then on Tuesday/Wednesday they have their A day classes, and on Thursday/Friday they have their B day classes. Each day has built in time for doing classwork with the teacher available, so that's a plus. Hopefully they won't have to do much schoolwork outside of these hours, given that it's all "home"work at this point.

This is certainly not the year anyone was thinking would happen, but here we are. We will make the best of it, hopefully our resilience will do us good.

OH, and I almost forgot that THIS happened! Senior photos!!!!

At this time every year

Every year since my Mom died, the back to school time of year has been so melancholy for me. The late start this year puts it closer to the change of seasons too, which adds to the feeling. Partly it's thinking about all our kids have missed out on by not having her in our lives these past 10 years. How she would have loved to see our kids in high school, becoming their own people! They would have been so good for each other. 

This isn't a new feeling, but when the days stop being so miserably hot and humid, and we have gorgeous early fall days like we're having this Labor Day weekend, the passage of time is just so clear. Soon the leaves will start falling, then the trees will be bare and the air will be cold. We'll be into a new year....the one where our baby boy graduates high school and maybe goes off to college. Sure, it's the way things are supposed to go, but that doesn't make it any easier. 

From listening to other parents, they all felt this way at this time. But then the world conspires to make both the kid and the parents really eager for the separation, as if by design. I remember Aly driving Jennifer so crazy that she couldn't wait for college drop-off, where the previous year it'd been unimaginably hard to even think about. So I know it will all be okay, and we'll all grow and change with the seasons.

For now I will just enjoy every day.