The end of an era

About a month ago I got an emailed letter that stated that the day care where all 3 of my kids go will close as of December 31. As you can imagine, that sent me into utter panic mode. There are waiting lists at all of the daycares here in Blacksburg, so it's hard to get 1 child into a center, let alone 3. Especially with only 3 weeks notice. And especially an infant. We've stayed relatively current on other waiting lists because, although we were very happy at our current daycare, you just never know what might happen. Well, I guess that paid off kind of. I was able to get spots at another good school for Blythe and Ethan to start January 3rd and for Brynn to start sometime in late February. Although I'd have to find something for Brynn for a short while, I was so relieved!

I was prepared for the stress of uprooting my kids from their current well-known, safe environment because there was no other option.

Well, then we got word that there was a potential buyer for the current daycare, but there were so many unknowns - would she buy it? what changes would she make? what would it be like? what would the transition be like? As these answers unfolded over the past few weeks, the stress and difficulty of making a decision of whether to stay or go to the new school got greater and greater. I don't think we've ever before had to make a decision like this that we knew would greatly affect the lives of everyone in our family.

I'm not going to go into the details of why we made our decision, but the decision we made was to start the kids at the new school. So today was Blythe and Ethan's last day at their current school. Brynn will stay until her spot at the new school opens up.

Making that decision gets complicated with friends our kids have made, friends we have made, a staff that is like family to us, Brynn's primary care giver who she likes just as much as me (or maybe even more). It's hard. It's really hard.

Blythe started at that school in August of 2007, when she was 19 months old. Ethan started at 12 weeks old and Brynn at 12 weeks old also. I'm trying to get excited about the possibilities at the new school - new friends, new teachers, new experiences, but it's hard because what we've had is so safe and comfortable and my kids have had wonderful experiences there.

So today is a sad day. But we'll cherish the memories we've had and continue to stay in touch with our old friends.