After a summer of painfully hard camp drop-offs, Harlow is off to kindergarten tomorrow. Is she ready? I honestly have no idea. I’ll tell you that I’m definitely not ready. Both because I can’t believe my baby is SO OLD and because she’s a late birthday and I’m questioning whether we should have held her back a year. Harlow is so tiny. She still hasn’t mastered her letters (although she’s improved greatly.) And I watched how Mazzy struggled a bit in kindergarten when she was also the youngest in her class (although, she’s now caught up.)

Harlow had kindergarten orientation today, which was an hour long with all the parents staying in the classroom.

She was excited to go. She had her outfit all picked out and insisted on taking a backpack full of snacks and water, even though that was totally unnecessary. I tried to convince her to leave it at home but she insisted and I didn’t think that was the thing to fall on my sword over. At least it wasn’t a purse, right?

She put on her “back-to-school necklace” which was designated as her “back-to-school necklace” only after I questioned her about it.

“Harlow, are you wearing that necklace?”

“Yes. It’s my back-to-school necklace.”

Well, okay then.

As you can see from the photo above, she posed for her “first day of school” pic LIKE A BOSS. I mean, Harlow might be bad at drop-off, but the girl knows how to take advantage of a photo opportunity.

Remember when I had to take Mazzy’s “First Day of Kindergarten” photo about 5000X because she could not follow my very simple instructions? Harlow had no such problem. I took literally three photos. The one on top was the very first one. No first day of school photo fails here. (Although, technically since it was the orientation, it was the day before her first day of school, but why split hairs?)

When we arrived, Harlow’s eye lit up when she saw balloons attached to the front steps. “Are those for us???” She walked in, located her name tag and then took the stairs up to her classroom. We met her teachers, mingled with the other kids and I watched as she beelined straight for the play dough at the activity tables.

All good.

She even hung her backpack up on her designated hook. (I should note that it was the ONLY BACKPACK there.)

Then the teacher called all the kids over for circle time. Harlow hung onto my hand and dragged me over with her. The teacher told the parents they could gather around too but Harlow was the only kid who made her mom sit on the floor so she could sit in her/my lap.

Then the teacher went around the circle and had each kid introduce themselves with their name and favorite color.

All the kids did as they were told until Harlow, who was last. She sat there silent.

“Do you want to introduce yourself?” I prodded gently.

Nothing.

“Harlow? Do you want to tell them your name?”

Nope.

“Her name is…” I waited for Harlow to complete my sentence but she said nothing.

“Her name is Harlow. And her favorite color is—”

“Pink,” Harlow chimed in loud enough for everyone to hear. Phew. I guess she didn’t want to risk mom getting that one wrong.

Then we got up, scoped out the classroom some more and headed down to the cafeteria for apples and cookies. At snack, Harlow started coming to life a bit more. She chatted up the little girl next to her. She went to town on her apple. She stole an extra bottle of water to stick in her backpack.

And then it was over. Harlow’s first hour of kindergarten complete.

Full day is tomorrow.

WISH HER/ME LUCK.