We had a blast getting the girls off to their first day of school and celebrating the start of a new school year!  The left picture is a before picture, and the right picture is an after picture, just to let you know we were all smiles by the end of the day too! 

  

 

Noelle showed me the hair tutorial on our Cutegirlshairstyles app last Sunday night, and begged me to do the #CGHDoubledutchback for her first day of 3rd grade.  It turned out so cute and different, and she told me she felt like a rock star all day!  She was so brave to wear something so different on her first day of school. 

 

I stayed at the school for a “Cheers and Tears” little social, so Mike and I drove in separate cars to school.  Noelle rode with Mike and Anna Kate rode with me, but when they saw each other across the court yard, they ran toward each other and started hugging.  It was so sweet!  They were both so proud to be at school together! 

 

Then, the moment of truth came when we had to drop off our Cutie Kate for kindergarten.  Bless her little heart.  When we began our goodbyes, the tears started flowing.  I told you guys this would happen!  I know her too well.  I’m calling it right now that Rose will wave us goodbye when we leave her for kindergarten.  They are each so precious and so different.  As Mike and I headed for the door, I turned around and saw this tender moment.  As much as my heart was breaking when I took this picture, I wanted to remember my girls loving on each other today.  It gives me such comfort to know that they have each other to lean on in life, as well as sweet baby Rose, who was in Jacksonville with her Poppa and Rara.  I knew this day was going to be traumatic for Anna Kate, and we needed to focus on her.  After we got Noelle all settled into 3rd grade, I definitely shed some tears, not gonna lie one bit about that!  You never want to see your kids stressed out or anxious, even though you know they are going to be okay even minutes later, it’s still no good.  I have never been so busy as I was that Monday running around catching up from the summer (and getting an allergy shot without my baby child trying to open the freezer that holds everyone’s serum!!!).  My heart was pounding as the minutes ticked by to meet them at the bus.  I couldn’t wait to hear about both of their days.  And we got excellent reports!  Whew!  We made it! 

And as I type this, week one is in the books, and we are about to start week two.  Anna Kate told us tonight she didn’t want to go to school tomorrow, but she had soooo much fun last week!  She’s still getting into the new big kid school routine, but she is doing great!  Noelle is an excellent student and does all of her work with all of her heart!  Math hit us hard this weekend, but she and Mike got it all figured out.  We are ready to rock and roll and see what the year holds!