Transition Week

At Leah's new daycare, they have a thing called "transition day."  It's where the new babies come to their new classroom for two hours just to get used to the teachers and other kids, and for parents to learn the new procedures for this age level.  Well, this whole week has felt like transition week for me. 

Daycare has not gone as I'd hoped it would.  Leah has screamed and cried everyday at drop-off which she's never done before.  Couple that with the fact that I cried when leaving our California daycare because I was so sad to leave her teachers and you have a lot of daycare-induced crying going on lately.  Aside from that, the teachers here haven't been especially friendly to us.  They're not rude, they just never seem excited or happy to see us.  Maybe they're just timid, or maybe they don't expect to be friends with the parents, or maybe it's because we're new, but it seems like they take a collective sigh when we walk in the door, "oh great, here come the new people, what are they going to ask me about now."  On her first day, BA picked her up after work.  He got to daycare at 5:40 p.m. and Leah was the last baby there and she was crying.  The teacher said she'd been fine until the other parents started coming and then Leah would cry each time she realized it wasn't her Mom or Dad (ugh - knife to the heart).  The teacher said that all the other kids are picked up by 5:30 p.m. in Leah's class, even though they are open until 6:30 p.m.  What?!?!  What kind of job does these other parents have?  I think many of them are stay-at-home mom's who just want a break in the middle of the day.  And I don't have a problem with that, except that it makes us look like the bad parents who leave our kid at daycare all day, and it stresses Leah out to see all her friends leaving first.  I can't take the guilt, so BA and I switched around our schedules for the remainder of the summer.  I'm no longer going to Emory for live classes; I'm staying at home and watching all the lectures online.  He will take Leah in on his way to work (which means she gets to daycare at 7:30 a.m. - she's the first to arrive) and then I'll pick her up in the afternoon.  Right now I'll work until about 3:30 p.m. and then pick her up by 4:00 p.m.  After we eat dinner, I hit the books again until about 8:00 p.m. or until I can't take it anymore, while BA puts Leah to bed. 

Since Leah has had the week-from-hell, I decided to pick her up early yesterday take her grocery shopping.  She had a blast; smiling at strangers, bouncing up and down in the cart as we rolled up the aisles.  She made so many friends at the store.  I was concentrating on picking out blueberries in the produce section when all of a sudden I looked up and these two ladies were waving and smiling at us.  Leah had been grinning at them with her hands clutched beneath her chin.  Another patron stopped me in the aisle to tell me that "she's adorable."  A Publix employee walked by and said "hi there, cheeks!"  And the check-out lady asked me her name and then talked to Leah the entire time we were checking out - and Leah talked back. 

Despite all the transition struggles, I still really like Atlanta.  As mentioned above (almost) everyone is friendly to us, people are holding doors for me (and I'm not even pregnant - it was a miracle when someone would hold the door for me in L.A. even when I was pregnant).  BA and I have gone through a touch of culture shock in Atlanta, just as we did when we first move to L.A. and thought that everyone owned a fedora and surfed all day.  The southern accents are thick and they are everywhere (but I like them).  I have to remember to be nice on the road and not drive like a jerk.  There are bugs everywhere!  Three years out west and I forgot about cockroaches.  Two days in our new house, and I remember how big southern cockroaches can be.  Yuck!  And the trees are still lovely.  In law school, professors will use hypotheticals to teach a concept.  At Pepperdine the hypothetical would usually go something like this, "Surfer walks across homeowner's property to access the beach.  Has Surfer committed a trespass?"  But in my Barbri-Georgia class the hypos go like this, "Bubba wants to buy some shrimp from Big Momma's Gulf Shrimp Company."  Hahaha - I'm not even joking - that was an actual Barbri-Georgia hypo.  Things are different here, but good.

And back to daycare ... I really like the school, I'm just not thrilled with the classroom yet.  I haven't adjusted to their style or manner of doing things, and I have to give it time.  It's a transition week and I have to remember that.  They seem to be doing fun things with the kids - this week was "Wacky Week" where everyday the kids and teachers wear something unusual.  Yesterday was backwards day where the kids and teachers wore their shirts backwards.  The day before was tacky day, and today is beach day.  They are going to let the babies play on a water table and with sand.  These are great developmental activities and it's much more than our daycare in California provided (although we loved our daycare in California because they were so sweet with Leah).  It's just hard on me to see her crying so much, but hopefully soon, the transition will be over and the tears will dry up. 

Leah and Daddy on their way to "Beach Day" at daycare.