First day of school

The day had to come and I woke up this morning with a knot in my stomach. Evani has been going to a home daycare since she was three months. At six months I could not take it anymore and my guilt had me quitting my job and staying home with her for almost a year – the best time of my life. Come 18 months I was ready to get out of the house once again. Ever since she has been going to another home daycare where both daughter and mom have made some lasting friendships.

Evani turned three in Feb and both us parents decided it was time for her to move to a preschool setting. Mainly to acquire better social skills and keep herself engaged with a wider variety of activities. So the search for a suitable school started and I haggled almost all parents I knew with kids for their thoughts on various schools. Our first choice was the Gold River preschool, since that’s where we live and eventually we do plan on sending her to the Gold River Discovery school starting kindergarten. However, that preschool does not provide before and after care and only runs from 8:30am – 11:30pm. Totally not geared for working parents. So the next option was of course private preschool.

We would have loved to enroll her to a private preschool in the Gold River area – however it turned out there was only one – La Petite. It had the perfect location – very close to home – convenient for both me and Shomeek for drop off and pick up. However, on our tour there I was very unimpressed with the lack of enthusiasm on part of the teachers – a big drawback right there.

Since La Petite was our only option in Gold River, we moved focus to Folsom – with definitely a larger number of preschools in the region. A good friend suggested Kinder Care since she knew one of the teachers there personally and highly recommended him. I was very pleased on my tour there. The staff was extremely friendly and caring, the teacher very enthusiastic and the facility overall seemed wonderful. It was close to my workplace and I knew this was it.

Today is her trial day and she starts next week going three full days. I’ve been building up this day for her with all sorts of excitement. So come this morning:

Dora dress: check
Dora backpack: check
Dora straw cup: check
And we’re off to school…



The scene was quite different after we went inside. The smiles soon faded and she burst into tears!