Preschool woes
I've been slacking quite a bit on the blogging lately, so I'm going to try to be a little more regular in the future. Part of the issue is that sometimes I write posts on the train and then forget about them for days, so I think I've posted but then I'll realize, whoops, it's still sitting on my desktop.
Devon and Walt spent the day together, and he had big plans for them to take the ferry across the bay to Sausalito and play -- but then it rained today. I heard recently that it's been the driest 12 months on record in California since they started keeping records (global warming again), and it's been an exceptionally dry winter, but today it did finally rain. So the whole plan got scuttled. Interestingly, Walt told me he tried to switch gears and take Devon swimming, but she didn't wan to go at all -- very odd, since she usually can't wait to go swimming at any time.
She did, however, want to get suited up in her rain jacket and boots and go tricycling in the rain. She's been rather obsessed with her rain jacket and boots, and unfortunately for her, since it's barely rained this winter, she hasn't had much of a chance to put them into action. This was an excellent opporutnity. Walt said they went tricycling through the Presidio until her hands were freezing; when they got back to the apartment, he convinced her to take a bath to warm up.
When I got home from work, she was sitting naked on the kitchen floor wrapping her horse in aluminum foil. She has 3 little rubber farm animals that my mom gave her for the toy barn that Devon plays with there, and Devon was taking these animals and creating aluminum "blankets." She conned us into giving her several sheets of foil that she used to create sheep, cow and horse en papillote. Yum.
Walt and I have been going through the nightmare of trying to get Devon into preschool. We totally fell down on the job by not applying at least a year in advance, so now it looks like we won't get her in this year. At least we've learned our lesson for kindergarten when it really matters, so we can make sure we apply early. It's very disappointing, though; I never thought I'd be one of those parents getting stressed out about preschool. Good grief.
We found a Montessori that we like a lot run by a total ex-hippie. This was a place that Elaine recommended, and we went to visit the place last week. It's a rather small place, but the kids do great art projects and have a lot of activities like dance, music and swimming. I was really sold on it because they have an outing every day and take public transportation all over the city -- I love the idea of a bunch of 3 and 4 year-olds taking the bus all over SF. I don't think we'll get in at all, though, since Barbara (aka ex-hippie) has been giving us the not-so-subtle brush off (and we're not on the waiting list since we didn't apply months in advance). When we went to visit, she even suggested that we might be lawyers, which would mean that we'd automatically not make the hippie cut. I don't know where she got that idea, though; maybe it was a mistake for Walt to wear jeans instead of sweats. We're now reduced to plain groveling; we're going to call her every 3 weeks to remind her that we want in; I'm just hoping that we'll get lucky and she'll have some sort of cancellation in the middle of the year. I've also corraled Liza into getting her sister-in-law to recommend us (she sent all 3 of her kids to this preschool) -- Jen doesn't know us, but as I said, we've been reduced to grasping at straws.
We had some friends over for dinner this weekend, and when we were talking about this whole preschool debacle, one of our friends said casually, "If she doesn't start preschool this year, she'll fall behind." It really made my blood boil (although I know that he didn't mean it to be an antagonizing comment). And again I thought, my god, I'm turning into one of those horrible parents obsessing over preschool -- the next thing you know, I'll be triple booking Devon in extracurricular activities so she'll be well positioned for college. Ugh. But it was amazing how that offhanded comment riled me up; I had a moment of empathy for those ambitious parents.
Devon and Walt spent the day together, and he had big plans for them to take the ferry across the bay to Sausalito and play -- but then it rained today. I heard recently that it's been the driest 12 months on record in California since they started keeping records (global warming again), and it's been an exceptionally dry winter, but today it did finally rain. So the whole plan got scuttled. Interestingly, Walt told me he tried to switch gears and take Devon swimming, but she didn't wan to go at all -- very odd, since she usually can't wait to go swimming at any time.
She did, however, want to get suited up in her rain jacket and boots and go tricycling in the rain. She's been rather obsessed with her rain jacket and boots, and unfortunately for her, since it's barely rained this winter, she hasn't had much of a chance to put them into action. This was an excellent opporutnity. Walt said they went tricycling through the Presidio until her hands were freezing; when they got back to the apartment, he convinced her to take a bath to warm up.
When I got home from work, she was sitting naked on the kitchen floor wrapping her horse in aluminum foil. She has 3 little rubber farm animals that my mom gave her for the toy barn that Devon plays with there, and Devon was taking these animals and creating aluminum "blankets." She conned us into giving her several sheets of foil that she used to create sheep, cow and horse en papillote. Yum.
Walt and I have been going through the nightmare of trying to get Devon into preschool. We totally fell down on the job by not applying at least a year in advance, so now it looks like we won't get her in this year. At least we've learned our lesson for kindergarten when it really matters, so we can make sure we apply early. It's very disappointing, though; I never thought I'd be one of those parents getting stressed out about preschool. Good grief.
We found a Montessori that we like a lot run by a total ex-hippie. This was a place that Elaine recommended, and we went to visit the place last week. It's a rather small place, but the kids do great art projects and have a lot of activities like dance, music and swimming. I was really sold on it because they have an outing every day and take public transportation all over the city -- I love the idea of a bunch of 3 and 4 year-olds taking the bus all over SF. I don't think we'll get in at all, though, since Barbara (aka ex-hippie) has been giving us the not-so-subtle brush off (and we're not on the waiting list since we didn't apply months in advance). When we went to visit, she even suggested that we might be lawyers, which would mean that we'd automatically not make the hippie cut. I don't know where she got that idea, though; maybe it was a mistake for Walt to wear jeans instead of sweats. We're now reduced to plain groveling; we're going to call her every 3 weeks to remind her that we want in; I'm just hoping that we'll get lucky and she'll have some sort of cancellation in the middle of the year. I've also corraled Liza into getting her sister-in-law to recommend us (she sent all 3 of her kids to this preschool) -- Jen doesn't know us, but as I said, we've been reduced to grasping at straws.
We had some friends over for dinner this weekend, and when we were talking about this whole preschool debacle, one of our friends said casually, "If she doesn't start preschool this year, she'll fall behind." It really made my blood boil (although I know that he didn't mean it to be an antagonizing comment). And again I thought, my god, I'm turning into one of those horrible parents obsessing over preschool -- the next thing you know, I'll be triple booking Devon in extracurricular activities so she'll be well positioned for college. Ugh. But it was amazing how that offhanded comment riled me up; I had a moment of empathy for those ambitious parents.
posted by Devon Szalva at
9:05 PM
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