Big 1st Grader

Ben started his first day of first grade today. He's been pretty nervous about it for the last couple of weeks. He didn't think he'd like going all day, he didn't want to do harder stuff, and I think he was afraid he wouldn't know where to go.

Last Friday they finally posted the class lists, so Ben and I drove down to the school to see who his teacher would be and who was in his class. He was happy to see that there were quite a few from his kindergarten class in his class with him. His two best friends were in other classes, but he was okay with that.

On Monday they had a meet the teacher night, so we went over to meet his teacher and she let him pick out where he was going to sit today. She wrote his name on a post-it and had him put it on the spot where he wanted to sit. He first put it at a table where no one else had put their names, but when his friend Juan showed up and put his name at a table, Ben moved his to sit across from him. He was happy to know that he'd be sitting by someone he knew.

Last night, Bryce gave Ben a Father's Blessing and told Ben that he wouldn't be apprehensive or nervous, that he would be excited. He said he'd be excited to learn and be able to learn what he needed, that he'd meet up with old friends and make new friends, that he would want to be good and obey his teacher. Ben actually has strong faith when it comes to prayers and blessings. He surprises and impresses me quite often with how strong his faith is. He started feeling a bit better after the blessing, but this morning when he got up, he said he wasn't nervous anymore, that he was just excited. He kept asking when it was time to go and made sure his brothers were up so they wouldn't make him late for the bus. He did get a bit nervous when the bus came and wasn't sure where he wanted to sit, so I had to go help encourage him to sit and that he would be fine, but he was still excited to be going to school.

Here are a couple pictures of Ben ready to go on his first day.

Ben wanted to look grumpy for the first one, mostly because he didn't want me to take his picture because he was afraid it would make him late:


Now he's finally smiling:


Here he's waiting for the morning bus (his first time on this morning bus) with Alex and the other kids: