Now a Kindergartener

My Noah has finished his very first year of school.  He's very excited to be able to say that he is now a kindergartener.  So excited that every grocery checker we've seen in the last two weeks is well aware.  (They are also aware that Jane is three and had a princess birthday party with a princess cake.  This is her standard conversation starter nowadays.)

Here he is on the first day of school.

(How can they be so little?!  This was not that long ago!!)

And on the last.

Wow.

It was not the easiest year for us.  Like any major challenge or change we've had with Noah (potty training comes to mind--ugh), the obstacles reveal personality characteristics that were either latent or went previously unnoticed by us.  After school started, we discovered that Noah is 1.) very smart and 2.) very distracted.  His distractability and difficulty focusing made it hard for the teacher and for his co-teacher (me!) to move him along through his tasks every day.  However, although he may not complete his worksheet because he was making his pencil into a rocket or daydreaming while looking out the window (probably planning his next invention or science experiment), the remarkable thing is that he does know all the material.  All this jogged Nathan's memory, and he remembers being much the same when he was a child.  And we all know he turned out okay (hello, Harvard Ph.D.--it's not me, so I can brag a little, right?  Right??), so here's hoping Noah follows suit.  I will say that he is a little sponge when learning something he's passionate about, like various nature and science facts.  The kid explained photosynthesis to me the other day in far more detail than I expected.

Some other things I learned about my son this year:

~He loves being read to.  I knew he liked it, but it is amazing how such an active kid really can sit still and listen for a long period of time to a chapter book.

~He does not like math.  I'm hoping this is because he doesn't feel confident yet; it'd be unfortunate to love science but not math.

~He has a gift for rote memorization.

~He is a kind friend.  In the yearbook, the Pre-K teachers were asked to give an adjective that described each child.  I was surprised to see that Noah's was "gentle."  And he got an "exceeds expectations" grade on his final report card for Courtesy and Politeness.

~All year, every day, when I picked him up from school, I'd ask him, "What was your favorite part of the day today?" And he invariably said, "Lunch."  Now, I will say, his school does do an excellent job at lunch.  The head of school reads from a chapter book, involves the kids in it, then celebrates birthdays.  But come on.  Lunch was his favorite thing?  Every day?  Yes, folks.  It was.

Here's my boy at his seat on the very last day of school.

My dad was able to come to the Closing Assembly, the event that ends the school year.  It was special that he was there.

This absolutely cracks me up, because it is our year in a nutshell.

Except that he is actually terrible at drawing people, God bless him.  And I have no idea when he decided he wanted to be a police officer.

He also made me a card:

Translation: "Dea[r] Mom, Thank you for teaching me.  Love Noah."

Oh my gosh, be still my heart.  He is so precious.

I sure do love that kid.