Bye Kinder!

I'm a little delayed in this post, but I had written the entire thing and for some reason it never published or saved.  ARGH.  

My little girl has grown so much over the past year - I can hardly believe it.  We met with her during the last week of school to do her "student led conference" which was really awesome.  Just watching her walk through those halls with such confidence and then lead us through her portfolio of everything she accomplished was incredible.  

The day before the last day of school, there was a graduation ceremony for all the kindergarteners.  They sang some sweet songs and then walked across the stage one by one.  It was a tough time waiting through all those kids to get to mine, but it was fun to see her receive her certificate.

All dressed up for graduation!

Afterward, we were able to go to her classroom and say hi for a short bit.  She was super excited to see Grandma and Grandpa too!

This was the last day I walked up to school to pick Lia up with Erin and Halle with me.  It was sort of sad to know that won't ever happen again - watching them walk hand in hand up to the school to get their big sister was so sweet.

Lia was full of anxiety for about a week leading up to the last day of school.  We were at the pool every afternoon just trying to give her a chance to unwind and work through emotions in her head.  She couldn't really verbalize how she was feeling, but my guess is that she was a mixture of sad, scared, excited and nervous.  Sucks to see a little kiddo going through that, but it is also part of life!

On the last day of school, she was excited for her party with her friends and also excited she was going to be able to leave school early!

The party at school was super cute and the teacher played a slide show of all the things they did this year.  Lia wanted pictures with all her friends and was asking when they could come play over the summer.  :)

Lia and Mrs. Redburn

After the party, Lia said bye to her teacher (probably the hardest part for her and for me!) and then we were off.  I told Lia she was in charge all day and could tell us what she wanted to do.  Originally, she wanted to go to a bounce house, but lots were closed for last day of school parties - so off to a new park with Chickfila!

After that, we headed out for ice cream!

I could feel the sense of relief Lia had after school was over - it was like she took her first deep breath in over a week.  The thing she had been anticipating is finally over and it wasn't that bad.  She is excited for summer and next up is the BEACH!!!