School - six weeks in...

Ok, so I've been a bit lax on the blogging front again recently, but life here seems to somehow be very hectic! Here I am playing catch up once more from the past few weeks. 

I am thrilled report both the boys seem to have really settled into school well now. Jake trundles off happily down the corridor with his friends and, more importantly for us, a smile on his face each morning. We haven't had a single tear for over two weeks (from me or him!) and each day he comes out telling us school was brilliant. After just six weeks he is coming home and teaching me and Dougie some Italian!!! As for Josh, he has made lots of new little buddies and just today I managed to spy on him for two minutes before picking him up, to see him loudly saying 'Maestra, Maestra" trying to get his teacher's attention through the throng of other children, to proudly show her the picture he had made! Such a simple thing but I had a grin from ear to ear watching it!

So, the trauma of the first few weeks has passed, although is not quite yet forgotten! What a relief! For those first four weeks (which felt like a lifetime) I was the worst mother in the world. Now when I see both of them going off to their classes and I stop to think, I am amazed by their strength, resilience and innocence combined...and unbelievably proud. We have asked a massive amount of both of them, being thrown into an environment that is totally alien, and both of them have coped unimaginably well, despite the difficult moments. 

But shame on me! I am now both very much relieved and somewhat secretly delighted to be the bystander and not the participant as I see other parents struggling to send their children off to class crying each morning...and I wouldn't change places with them for anything in the world. Oh well, I guess nobody's perfect!