First Day of School

And suddenly... it was the first day of school!  It felt... weird.  Like a soft start or something?  Because while most of the kids started school, Bentley was still here!  So rather than enjoying a quiet, empty house, I was bugging him to finish cleaning and packing up his room and figuring out what stuff he was taking to college and whether or not it would fit in the luggage we bought him...  It was a bit of a slow-but-still-slightly-stressful, painful process that was best done at the last minute.  But it meant that nothing felt like school has actually started!

But we still got pictures!  Camille-- who is in 4th grade now!-- was the first to head to the bus stop:

We had a bit of a cold snap, so she actually got to wear her sweatshirt without cooking!  Also-- her hair is getting so long!

Camille is very excited for the school year!  She got Ms. Simpson and Mrs. Wilson, who both Ryder and Colton have had and loved, so that was awesome.  And two of her good friends are in her class!  So she's been coming home very happy these days, which makes me happy, too.  It was weird taking her to meet her teachers and only having one kid at the elementary school.  The last time that happened, Bentley was in 1st grade...  {Sniff, sniff...}

Everyone else was up to see her off (and to do our Come Follow Me lesson!), but as you can see, some of the kids were still in their jammies!

Craig was the next to leave, so I made him sit for a picture, too, and he was very sweet about obliging me!

He's so good about always eating an apple and a salad.  Also, I never expected him to still have such fantastic hair in his forties.  That's my man!

Next it was Ryder and Colton's turn to head to middle school!  They're also pretty happy this year: Ryder is excited to be an 8th grader, and Colton's BFF is in all his classes with him, so he's happy, too.  What a great year for my kids!

And finally, Bentley dropped Kendra off at the high school because he wanted the car (I think she was pretty nervous about driving herself that first day, too).

I kind of love that she stole my sweatshirt for the first day of school.  I'm fine with not being cool.  But maybe I'm not embarrassing?

So everyone came back happy and Bentley and I had gotten some good work done on his room while they were gone!  And then, that evening, we went out to Citizen Burger Bar with Tom and Donna as a last hurrah before Bentley left for school!

Kind of proud of myself for getting all nine of us into one selfie!

The weather was PERFECT for sitting outside, we didn't have to wait long, and it was just an overall lovely evening!

Bentley loves his grandparents!