Day Care

Renee has been going to day care for a little over a week now.  I wasn't sure how either one of us would do with the transition since we had been together all day, every day since she was born.  But, so far it's going great!

Her first day was rough.  Her primary teacher, Erika, noticed that whenever the room was quiet Renee was okay, but got very upset when there was a lot of noise from the other babies.  And as you can imagine, in an infant daycare with ~15 babies under the age of 1, the room is not quiet very often or for very long.  So, she did a lot of crying that day.  I almost cried leaving her there, but stayed strong, telling myself that she would be just fine, and I made it through the day without shedding a tear :D  I didn't even go and visit her, I didn't want to traumatize her (translation: myself) even more by leaving her twice in the same day.  Thankfully when I picked her up at the end of the day she was sound asleep in her crib (not screaming her head off like I imagined), which was very comforting for a worried mom who doesn't know how anyone else could possibly take care of her baby the way that she does!

Here's a picture of Renee and her primary teacher Erika on her first day.

Since then she has been doing great.  I drop her off every morning and hand her to one of the teachers, whoever is available to hold her at the moment, and give her a kiss goodbye.  And she looks completely relaxed with the situation, not caring at all that I am no longer holding her (something which was a major problem up to this point!).  She barely gives me a second glance as I leave; she is now much more interested in watching what the older, more mobile babies are doing.  I feel like if she could, she would say something like, "bye Mom, see you later!".
 
What's really great is that all the teachers love her (I mean, how could they not)!  They get a kick out of her silly baby babbling, goofy smiles and adorable laughing.  There is even a little friendly competition going on among them about who gets to take care of her more.

Other than day 1, her first week went great and when I picked her up on Friday, Erika handed me this:

Renee's 1st art project

(outside of the card)

 

 (inside of the card)

Renee "made" a Father's Day card for her Daddy, complete with orange construction paper and green baby hand and foot prints :D  It was so cute, I was jealous that I didn't get one!  Jeff will just have to share it with me!!!