I Cried at Day Care on Friday

Yes, you read that right. I cried at day care on Friday. R has been gradually transitioning into her new preschool classroom at day care, with a new teacher and a new set of classmates, although some of the children in her new preschool class were previously in her toddler room with her. She started on Wednesday, and both Wednesday and Thursday she was in her toddler room at the end of the day. So when I went in Friday, I was surprised to see that she wasn't in the room. And all her stuff was gone. Everything got moved over--she's now fully and officially in the preschool room. I burst into tears. I didn't know I was going to be so emotional.

But it kind of snuck up on me-- I was expecting the transition to take longer. Like a week, or maybe two weeks, or something. Especially because Ms. W and I had had a couple of conversations about how R is a very cautious child and tends to be slow to warm up to new things, even when a familiar person is with her. So I figured a few days of afternoons, gradually stretching things out.

But she ended up staying there most of the day on Thursday. And Friday J and I were late taking R to day care because we took her cherry picking with us (more on that in an upcoming blog post!) and her toddler class was on a trail walk, so we went straight to preschool. She never ended up going to her toddler class on Friday.

I still feel a little bit in shock about the whole thing. I'm sad to say goodbye to the toddler room, even as I'm really excited about the new preschool room. R had been in that room since she started at this day care last February, so 16 months. She's pretty attached to Ms. W and Ms. S and to her friends in that room. I know she'll adjust just fine, but it's still a little sad to think we won't be seeing Ms. W and Ms. S every day.

I've been reminiscing a bit about the last 16 months at day care and remembered this story that I never wrote about on here.

Ms. W shares a name with a very well-known fast food restaurant. One day when I was pregnant with RUS, I had a sudden and inexplicable craving for a spicy chicken sandwich, and so J and R and I all got into the car and headed out for an adventure. We told R we were going to Wendy's to get dinner for Mommy. She was SO excited! She often gets excited about going places or having little adventures with us.

We got there, got our food (in the drive-thru), and headed home.

When we got home, R burst out crying. She was SO sad! She kept saying, "I want to go to Wendy's!" and J and I explained we'd already gone to Wendy's, and showed her the bag of food we'd brought home. But then we figured it out: she thought she was going to see Ms. W at Wendy's. We laughed and laughed, and then we comforted R and explained that Ms. W doesn't actually live at Wendy's.