new adventures

Of all the girls, the one I've had the most emotions over going to school is Boo. 

My sensitive, nature loving, quirky, hobbit girl. 

She has been unsure about starting high school. It will be her first ever school experience. 

Boo is one of life's observers. She notices everything, holds back and gets involved only when she is really comfortable.

Yet one of her very favorite activities is Drama.  When she is on stage she has no fear, she dances, sings and acts her heart out.

She also attracts friends easily, even though she tries her very best to be a mysterious loner.

It's hard.
After seven years of homeschooling and being given responsibility over her own timetable, hair and clothing choices and all the time she needed to rest and play throughout the day as well as help me run errands, cook etc, it'll be a learning curve to give up that level of autonomy and responsibility.

As a Mama, my perspective on certain, rules, regulations, disciplinary measures, classroom layout, free time and the way younger people are treated differently by older people in the education system has changed much over these last years.
We've talked about the way things work and why. We have lots of teacher friends and she knows that teachers only want the best for their students and as far as the system goes, humanity usually trumps bureaucracy.

I've given her three pieces of advice. 

Be brave be kind and be yourself.

I hope they will be words of life to her during both the excitement and challenge new experiences bring.
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And, if things don't work out, she, we, us... will carve out another path through bracken and fern of ways yet untrod. After all, it's not like we haven't done it before.

We bought her uniform yesterday.
The other girls were at a friends house so it was just us three. Boo, Tani and I.

The woman at the clothes shop said she had gone to the same school Boo was going to.
While she wrapped up the Blazer, kilt, leotard, dance shoes and hockey boots she chatted with Boo and I noticed a seed of expectancy and excitement grow into a small upward curve upon her mouth.
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With her pocket money she bought a beautiful, hand bound notebook to journal the coming year in. Boo loves crisp white pages full of  possibility just as much as her Mama does.

We took her to lunch at a favourite local cafe and she told us about how she wants to work with wolves like Jim and Jamie Ducher, or set up camp in the rainforest to research and protect  endangered species.

Then we walked along the canal, now frog-green with pond-weed and dappled by a canopy of trees and romantisised the life of narrow-boaters, imagining evenings watching foxes, and mornings waking up to birdsong.

On the way home she said she was excited about her new adventure.

A small paragraph in a new chapter

Seeing the girls dressed in their school uniforms arouses many feelings within me.
On the one hand, they love their gingham summer dresses, shiny shoes and white ankle socks and they are excited about art club and gardening club, sports days and Summer fêtes which makes me very glad and more than a little relieved... Yet after homeschooling for so many years my perspective has changed concerning things as seemingly benign as uniforms, classes, homework and the like. I realise that these are things we can talk about, discuss and question at home as we navigate our way along this new path.

Of course I also miss our gentle days together here at home. There is a nostalgia and that quiet ache all mothers understand too well as their children grow up.  My home is very quiet during those 6 hours they are away.

The girls have made lots of friends very quickly and there are lots of play-dates booked over the Summer holidays. However the friendships of little girls can be  mercurial and being used to their small but steadfast homeschool buddies this has come as some surprise.
Seraphina is strong, outgoing and full of energy but her feelings and attachments run deep which makes it hard for her not to get hurt when friendships don't last. Realising that being besties forever when you're 8 and a half  might only mean besties for this afternoon's break-time can be somewhat dismaying for such an earnest type. Matilda is more sanguine and philosophical but there have been moments when she's suddenly burst into tears about something that happened during the day and I wish I could have been there at the time to help her work it out.

Emmy was bullied badly during her last two years at school and it has left me concious of how children often bottle things up and push on when they feel powerless.
I probably read too deeply into things and am too sensitive on their behalf. I know we can't protect them from everything but I want them to know that they can seek comfort and help from the grown ups around them whenever they need it and just as importantly, they can change their circumstances if they are unhappy.

They are always excited to go off in the morning and are getting used to making sure they have everything they need the night before to avoid tears and last minute panics of "Wear's my jumper?" "Where's my library book.!" "You're wearing my shoes!"  etc... etc...

The school has a real family feeling to it which was really important to us. They made no issue of the fact that Seraphina struggles with her reading. On her second day, her teacher gave her a special art book all her own because she loves to draw and paint.

On Monday the girls took a dried sea urchin that had washed up on the shore while we were at the sea on Saturday. They were really excited to research sea urchins so they could talk about their find at school. "Show and tell" has definitely  become a weekly highlight.

Yesterday we went to their sports day event and although I can't share pictures of the races as they involve other kids Nola and I did sneak into the veggie garden to take some pictures :)