Kindergarten Pre-registration

My oldest baby is growing up too!  Addison is getting ready to accomplish quite a milestone in her life (and mine).  She's starting kindergarten this August!  How can I already have a child old enough for public school!?

Of course, since we have to go through a confusing set of registration steps starting in February, I have been given plenty of time to prepare myself for this huge change.  We've loved having her in preschool and it's the perfect amount of time where we don't have time to miss her before she's home and playing with us due to her M/W/F half-day schedule.  I think we will go into shock when she's gone ALL day in Kindergarten!  What will we do without her?  Jonas will surely miss his little play buddy during the day.  Hopefully Brooklyn will be able to keep up with him by then.  

Addison is VERY excited to start kindergarten.  I just know she's going to absolutely love it.  She's such a smart girl and loves to play with friends and be social and learn things which is pretty much what kindergarten entails.  Well that and riding the bus!  She's beyond excited for the bus.  Ever since I can remember she and I have looked for buses as we've driven along our way.  Thankfully, we have some very good neighbor/family friends who also has a daughter on the same bus so my fears/worries of the school bus will be minimal.  

We talk lots about kindergarten.  I always tell her that I will miss her when she's gone but anytime I miss her I will just remember how much fun she is having with her friends, eating lunch, playing, and learning and then I will be happy for her.  And of course we will be anxiously waiting at the bus stop for when she comes home each day.  I'm trying really hard to not pass my motherly worries/anxieties on to her.  I want her to have her very own experience and embrace the big step and have fun with it.  If she's anything like me (and she most assuredly is) I'm sure there will be some nerves right before school starts but she's a very brave girly and will do great at overcoming them.  We've already even discussed how Daddy can give her a blessing to help her be calm and enjoy it all.  

I could go on and on about the excitement of Addison starting kindergarten but this post was really only supposed to be about her "pre-registration"  ;)  I'm learning all the ins/outs out of this whole process and it is becoming less and less confusing as time goes on.  Right now all we do is "pre-register" her and confirm that she will be attending and where we live so they can make sure each elementary school can house those children who live closest in their boundaries.  We aren't interested in joining the "lottery" for a local year-round school here so it should be a fairly easy and simple process.  We already got an email confirmation that she was accepted/enrolled into Centerton Gamble Elementary.  The Fighting Colts!  ;)  

Now we just anxiously await the next step...ACTUAL registration.  That one will include a Mommy/daughter date.  We are totally amping up this huge step.  Right now everything seems so exciting.  I'm sure I'll be sad to see my baby go about the time August comes around.