First Days of School

I always loved the beginning of the new school year. New backpacks, new shoes, new school supplies. I loved going to CVS to get trapper keepers (remember those?) and pens and markers and all that fun stuff. I've heard a lot of people around here complaining about the lists of school supplies and books for their older kids, but I sort of wish 2 and 4 year olds got lists of school supplies to buy!!
Anyway, the start of the school year has been fairly smooth for the kids, definitely easier for Simon than for Eli. Eli has been easing into Gan Frieda with Monday being 2 hours, 3 hours on Tuesday, 4 hours today and tomorrow starts the full 5 hours. On Monday and Tuesday I brought him in and stayed for a few minutes to get him settled. Both days he cried when I left and spent most of his time there with Lili holding him. The saddest thing happened yesterday when Debbie brought Maya shortly after I had dropped off Eli. Debbie said Eli was playing quite happily and then he saw her. He took one look at her and ran to her with his lip quivering and his eyes filling with tears saying "Mommy...Mommy..." (I don't think he was calling her Mommy, I think it was more that he wanted her to bring him to me) She picked him up and he cried for a little while, but then he was ok after. Poor thing. Today, I didn't go downstairs with him and left him crying with Frieda at the door. She said he had a great day after that although he did cry a little bit when he saw Tali bringing Uri. He and Uri set each other off and when one cries the other does too. But when they aren't being sad, they have been playing nicely together. Eli has been very happy in the afternoons, so he can't be too traumitized by school! He also is very happy to leave the house in the morning--he takes his bag and says "b'bye Daddy, b'bye Si-em" and then when we turn onto Frieda's street he says "more Frieda Lili." So I think he will be ok.
David has been taking Simon to school in the mornings and Simon runs right in and barely even says goodbye. I have been picking him up and am a little overwhelmed just by the sheer number of kids--35 in the class and some of them look so big to me because it's Pre-K and Kindergarten combined. Chaim actually referred to one boy as "the giant boy was on the swing..." Today right after we left Simon realized that he forgot his water bottle so we went back in and all the other kids were gone already so I actually got to speak to the teachers, Smadar and Sarah, for a few minutes. They are great and Simon loves them--he gives them big hugs when he gets to school in the morning and when he leaves. Smadar was surprised when I told her we'd only been here for a year because she said Simon understands everything (either that or he just puts on a good show) and his Hebrew is good. He tells me he only plays with Chaim, but I asked Smadar and she said he already has lots of friends and he plays with lots of kids. He probably just doesn't know any of their names. She also said he is such a happy kid which is always nice to hear. Hopefully missing 6 weeks when we go to America in a week and half won't make things harder for him when we get back. Everyone else will have been off for Sukkot and will be coming back at the same time, so hopefully it will be ok.