First day of school at East Fremantle Primary

Rough night filled with 2 sick kids and multiple bed swaps.  Day officially kicked off on a positive note at 6:45am - later than usual.  All kids starving, which was a good sign.  Chocolate-banana crepes were ordered by all.

Lily decided to wear her uniform up to school and decide once she got there if she felt up to staying for the day.  The walk is a serious hill, so we took two strollers.  We began with a check-in at the front desk.

We began with Lily's classroom.  All of the parents were so friendly, introducing themselves.  Lily's teacher is Mrs. Millie Taylor and Ms. Nicola Vinicombe.  Lily went with a new little friend to hang up her backpack and gave us quick kisses goodbye.  She really seemed excited to be there.

We then headed over to Caden's room.  He was excited to do the playsets beforehand, but ended up getting so caught up in the classroom that he forgot about it. Caden's teachers are Mrs. Jeannette Howard and Mrs. Nicola Sparks (although I would say James and Clare are by far the two most popular names).  Kids bring a piece of fruit for tea time which gets placed in a big basket outside of the classroom and sliced up for all to share.

Cute little restrooms in Caden's room.

Admiring the art supplies, located next to a fish tank - score!

Caden's introduction

Corey, Gia and I stuck around for the morning assembly where Caden was introduced.  It was the cutest thing ever. The teacher held up a globe and showed the class where America was.  Caden initially was blinking back tears, but really settled in when the teacher asked who wanted to be his special friend and show him around and every hand shot up :)  She then asked if he wanted to go sit with his parents or with one of his new friends and he said, "With one of my new friends, please." :) Mommy was fighting back tears at this point.  So sweet.  I have a snippet of video I will post tomorrow.  If you watch, notice how one of the kids yells out East Fremantle Dockers.  They are in to footy as much or more than our ND football counterparts!

We headed out and were amazed at the social hour that forms just outside of the classroom between parents.  Parents milling about, chatting, while their younger kids played.  Very laid back. As we left, we met another mom with two little ones heading down the hill.  Turns out her son Cooper is in Caden's class and one of the little girls, Daisy, is 3 and they live just across the street.  She runs a marketing consulting firm called Bread Box.  We are planning play dates already :)

Gia and I headed out for town straight away to try and find the office supply store to get the mandatory school supplies for Lily and Caden's rooms.  While we did not end up finding the store (we did get directions), we did find a few cute clothes for the kids and some art supplies to support our pending projects.  We made a visit to Target too.  Note the different bags.

Gia fell asleep on the way home, so I read a bit and had a lunch of squash-ginger soup.  Squash is big here, and happens to be one of those things I could eat for every meal, so one more +!

Quick turnaround to pick up kids at 3.  Weather is 72 today, so I packed a beach bag so we could choose between bus/train to beach, or just a walk for coffee.  When we arrived, Lily's class was out doing an outside sport.  Apparently Tuesday's they need to wear gym shoes.

I had a chance to tell her to meet us at Caden's room and there we stayed until about 4pm after school with many other kids and their parents playing.  The kids have seemed to make so many friends already.  And Caden, who I was worried about starting Kindergarten, announced that his school is "awesome!" - so all is well.  Lily and Caden were commenting that it was like they were the principles and everybody wanted to get to know them.  Caden mostly played with a girl with ponytails, who when drawing a picture of his day for our scrapbook, was troubled that he couldn't recall if her hair was blonde or reddish :)

I guess he decided more red.  Notice the play apparatus is the same one he has a photo on the day before.

After our play at the school we walked to George Street to Cookie Dough.  Along the way we passed a little boy in the EFP uniform helping his mom with yard work.  As we walked past he yelled out, "Hi Lily" and she blushed.  So sweet.  We had cookies and baby cinos (steamed milk with chocolate sprinkled on top) before heading to the play set to wait for Corey to get some dinner.

Once Corey arrived we headed down the street to find a place for dinner...

Kids took turn riding on the bike one of Corey's colleagues loaned him.

We ordered a pizza to go - one with rocket (arugula) and prosciutto (we called this peperoni for the kids) and the other with squash (yup), mushrooms and roma tomatoes.  I set my new record of 4 pieces of pizza in one sitting on this pizza.  Yum!

New words the kids have started using already include, 'pardon' instead of 'what' (much better), 'Toilet' instead of 'restroom', 'rubbish' instead of 'trash' or 'garbage', 'Ta' instead of 'thank you', and 'mate' instead of 'friend' - and it has only been a week!