"Schoooools OUT! FOR SUMMER!"

I'm going to do something different and bring back a blog I wrote after Noemie's first day of school. As we head into the last week of school (some of you already had your graduation ceremonies and got a head start into the next chapter), I find it completely surreal to reread this one. How may micro/macro/GINOURMOUS changes have happened since that first day. Even though she talks a big sassy game of being done with school and ready for summer, you can tell that sneaky fear is setting in of yet another change. When will she see her school friends again? Wait, is her teacher she LOVES not her teacher anymore? Who IS!?! Wait where am I going every day?

"... what's a CAMP?!!!"

I think we can get very caught up on filling the gaps in our future - getting it all booked, signed up, (in our case) waitlisted, for what's next. It's equally important to look back at how much has been accomplished. So many shoe sizes later, so many more words in her vocabulary, so many more emotional hues in her spectrum of feelings, so many more eye rolls, so many BIG boxes checked, endless amount of lined paper with crooked determined letters, SO MANY hilarious drawings where we get little snapshots of her brain.

It was a LOT and we are all still here. There were mornings where I really wasn't sure if we were going to make it. I had no more patience or tricks up my sleeves to get that body dressed and in the car before the bell rang. So just want to take a moment to give ourselves a pat on the back (you might need a full body massage). I've said this before, so much of their finding their footing and a steady rhythm is because of the beautiful independence and structure you instilled. They're now the ones running with the cumbersome torch, you might have handed it to them at the start line, fan it every now and then, hold it for them while they finish their popsicle.  But they're doing the work and braving that gnarly jungle.

Unlike how the blog starts, our class schedule is actually fuller than usual. We have some new times we're trying out. Pretty perfect timing after Father's Day I am offering a STUDS Strength Training - Wednesdays at 6:30p. Just wanted to reiterate even though it has a lot of strength movements and a breakdown that is especially beneficial to guys - it's for ANYONE. Anyone that feels like their body has stubborn habits and needs a bit of an intervention. Still fun and circuit style, but more foundational strength. Stripping things down to the studs and building from there. Tell your hubbies, your friends - or YOU COME!

Sent 8.22.23

Hi my pink erasures, bright new kicks, sharp haircuts, pimped out backpacks, and a sassy school yard sashay... 

It's going to be a small pilates schedule this week, we have to make space in the morning for a new stage we're settling into, bracing ourselves for some shifts in our household. Looks like we're not the only ones feeling the shifts under our feet, and maybe welling up in our eyes.  Sweet ones and necessary ones, but definitely a tremble that's hard to ignore. This morning our 5yr old walked up a huge flight of stairs, with her sequin kitty backpack strapped to her holding her water, extra change of clothes, and her favorite kitty stuffie.  Then was swallowed up through the huge heavy doors of her first government institution, Elementary School. 

 Everyone kept preparing me for this first day of Kindergarten, that it will be an emotion that will sneak up on you and that it's okay to feel anxious and sentimental. I honestly felt really calm heading into it despite all these pep talks.  I was feeling fine all morning and then yeh, there it came, really without warning despite all the warning.  Watching her walk up those stairs she just looked so small.  I had to hold back that swampy feeling in my face.  She thought of every little inch of her outfit, the bracelets, the little zipper tassels on her backpack that match her shoes ... so you know she cares. You just really want it to all go okay for her.  But mainly the tears were pride.  Because even though she knows she's only 5, she even threw in her extra undies in case of an accident, and she has zero idea what this whole thing even is,  she still strutted into that huge building with the most confident stride, hardly looking back to see if we were behind her.

On a way smaller scale this past weekend we went to a birthday party where they had a reptile guy. His strategy was smart how he introduced each terrifying creature, which he kept in a pile of tupperware behind his lawn chair! He started with the small cute babies and then worked up to the bigger, more slithery reptiles.  Providing a whole lot of reassuring intel on each one of them.  Scanning the room you quickly realize this was his way of building trust not just for the children - but the parents!   Because before I knew it she went from running up to me with a baby turtle in her hand and then moments later a mama python around her neck.  Then once a child was done with "one" (as in a tarantula, a dragon looking gargoyle, SO MANY SNAKES) they would hand it to a parent as if it was the wrapper to a snack or a toy they were tired of playing with.  My favorite part was when a parent looked down to discover what they were holding.  At first every adult was squirmy and freaked out, but after a while they actually started to fully immerse in the experience.  We all became a curious student and less of a cautious bystander at a kid's party.  Much like these first days of Kindergarten I'm watching the children set the tone for the adults. 

I asked Noemie on the way back from the reptile party if she was scared, she said very simply, "at first I was scared, then I wasn't."  Putting an emotion as complex as fear in such a simple way is really brilliant.  It's a little too early to assess how she's feeling about these first days in this big girl school, but I have a feeling it will be exactly that.  "At first I was scared, and then I wasn't."  Something I'm going to keep as my personal motto when I'm challenged with something.

This week lets play with this childlike way of processing fear. Be prepared but also not let that paralyze us.  We also need to leave room for the unknown, substitute worry with wonder, and be a curious student instead of crippled with concern.  The commitments we are scared of, the trips we feel too guilty to go on, the exercises we're too intimidated to try, we should approach like the kids holding the snakes.  That snake becomes way less scary the second you finally hold it, and the longer you hold it the more you see there is nothing to worry about.  Same with those doors we enter through on the first day of Kindergarten.  Plus both give you the coolest story to feel proud of, "first I was scared, and then I wasn't."

Excited to make your bodies sweat, smile, strut towards our fears with curiosity.

XO!

Celeste