Jorja's first day of preschool

Yesterday was Jorja's first day of preschool. I really like her little school and her teacher "Ms. Anna." She was very excited and ran into the classroom to play, hardly noticing that we were leaving. There was sadly, no goodbye kiss for mommy. Just a wave and a "bye" as she played with some baby dolls.

Here she is, all dressed and ready to go:


And here she decided that her backpack was too heavy:



Waiting outside for the doors to open:


Here was her first day's lunch - grape skewers, cucumber stars, carrot flowers, bologna hearts and crackers(yes, I'm having fun with bento again):


And this was the goodbye:


Pickup was another story altogether. Jorja was obviously exhausted. As we were leaving, she decided to run into the one year old class. After trying to be calm and ask nicely, (gotta keep up appearances to the other moms) I finally went into the class and picked her up to take her out. That's when she bit my shoulder. Not wanting to make a scene, I decided to discipline her when we got to the car. I asked her to help me push Josie's stroller. As we got out the door, she made her break. She ran right down the sidewalk and in front of a suburban...with me close on her heels - I yelled to Jonah to stay with Josie and the stroller.

She broke right and made her way toward the playground, behind a bush. As I tried to run to one side to grab her, she would dart toward the other. We went back and forth a couple times, me getting redder and redder while she was giggling. It was fantastic fun for a 2 year old and insane humiliation for a mother. I finally faked her out and grabbed her arm.

Jonah, who was back at the stroller, pushed Josie to the car while I manhandled a screaming, kicking, punching Jorja to her car seat. We were making quite a scene, Jorja screaming "don't do that", and "you're hurting me", while I'm practically breaking her in half pushing her down into the seat to get it buckled. If you have never had a child straighten their body out completely to keep you from buckling them in, you are missing one of life's great challenges. It never ceases to amaze me how strong a 2 year old child can be. It's a real test of strength and will to get them into the seat without killing them or causing some damage to internal organs.

By the time we got home, she was only screaming at half volume, but she was really red and had tears streaming down her face. I plopped a very sweet and overtired Josie into her crib and literally had to pin Jorja to her bed with my arm to get her to stay in. She continued the screaming fit with me next to her and within seconds she was out and had probably one of the best naps of her life.

I can't wait for 1:30 today. I would say that she could never top that performance, but let's not kid ourselves. This is Jorja...