Ryland's first day of work...as a Kindergartener

Ry’s morning starts off with me waking him up. “Ry, good morning – it’s time to wake up”. Ry responds with this “Mama, choot-choot more sleep… please.” I tell him he has 2 more minutes and when I go back 2 minutes later, he says “ok” and gets up. He’s never before asked for more sleep…I don’t know where he learns this stuff, but it cracks me up!


I read an article last night that focused on raising self-sufficient kids. Basically the point was to not help kids too much; let them do things on their own and figure things out. The problem with this is that it takes so much patience…something I don’t have an excess of. My favorite quote was this “In the long run, their independence is your freedom.” That really hit me. I sure don’t want to have a 28 year old living at home with me, having me still cut their meat up in small bites and pick out their clothes everyday! So this morning, I thought of this and instead of getting Ryland ready for school, I coached him. He got ready for school with no problems and was pretty excited for school. Luckily this did not wear off when we got to school and he was ready for everybody to go to ‘work’.

Once at the school, we waited in the cafeteria with him until the bell rang and then walked with him to his classroom. Once in the classroom he asked me where his friends were and I explained that he’d have to make friends. “Just ask people if they will be your friend”. I mean who could possibly say no to him…he’s the cutest thing ever. He was a little bit hesitant, but eventually started playing with play-dough and bid us adieu. He was all smiles and as we were walking out I could already hear him asking the teacher if he could ‘work’ on the computers… Dustin and I were very happy and proud of our little guy as we walked out of the school, past other crying kids and parents. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again…the kid’s a trooper; we really lucked out! As proud as I am of Ryland, I am equally as proud of us. It took a lot of work to turn him around on this whole school idea since Meet the Teacher night. We were so relieved when all of our thousands of conversations about school/work over the weekend actually helped the situation. Behind every good kid are good parents, right?

After dropping him off, it was off to work for both Dust and I. My first official day back in the office went well and I am glad to be back in familiar territory! Picking up Ry and walking home was the highlight of the day. Chandler and I got to hear his version of what happened during the day. Here’s a snippet. “Did you make any new friends?” Ry – “yes, many.” We asked him what their names were and he said “I don’t know, but beeg keesses.” Oh great. I am now that mom…the mom of the boy who kisses everyone on the playground, perfect.

He was pumped to come home to surprises/payment for a day of work well done! We sure are proud of the little guy and to makes things even better, he had so much fun that he wants to go back!!! I better go and handle the parent’s homework assignment, make tomorrow’s lunch, etc. Dust just put him to bed and I heard Ry say this to him “Goodnight, Sweetie”…I guess he’s spending too much time with me!!

First day of school

Looking smart

All geared up and ready to go!

Stone family going to 'work'

Close up - super excited!!!

Ry's chair in Mrs. Kaufman's classroom

(next to the computers of course!)

Papa and Ry waiting for class to start

Ry and Aunt Chandler home after school.  Ry's first day of Kindergarten & Chand's first day of being a High School Senior!