last day of preschool

Posted by & filed under Being a Mom, Oliver.

Yesterday was Oliver’s last day of school for the year. His last day at MSP (which we will miss terribly). His last time to be together in a classroom with that group of friends and teachers that he has grown to love. And his last time to call himself a preschooler.

Yes, Oliver would like to casually point out to anyone who asked that he is now officially a Kindergartener. Oy.

It feels like only yesterday that we were taking him for his first day of 4s Preschool – Hazel and I with our pouty lips because we already missed brother so much. I’d put together this photo of him on the way into school with a list of all of the things he loved at that age (so nice already to look back on this – he’s changed a lot over the past nine months):

oliver1stday4spreschool

So I felt like it was only natural yesterday on our way in to school that I take one more photo of him so we could document what a year of school has done to our boy. (I obnoxiously emailed and texted Ryan and Audrey, begging them to not let me forget in the excitement of the day to grab this shot.)

And, I remembered! Here is our happy guy, wearing rain boots on a sunny day in May (for the record I didn’t know he was wearing these until I got him out of the car at school) looking old and feeling glad:

His teacher has lovingly recommended that we begin to work with him on his replacing the “f” sound for anything with a “th” sound. I love hearing him say “fank you”, but she’s right. It’s time. We made up a silly sentence: “When I’m thirty, I think I’ll be thirsty”, which still sounds like, “When I’m firty, I fink I’ll be firsty” unless he takes his time and works through it. He’s doing great but I’m a little sad to see it go.

After all, I’m already having to deal with the fact that I’m a parent of a Kindergartener. How much change can one Mama handle all at once?

Do your babes have funny little speech habits that you hate to break? Do you feel as recalcitrant as I do about righting their pronunciation as it will signal yet another step out of babyhood?

Do you have littles that are graduating their way into Kindergarten, or Middle School, or High School or *gasp* college? Please tell me it doesn’t go as quickly as it already feels!

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39 Responses

  1. keight 11 May 2012 at 9:52 am

    here i lay my ebenezer to judahs adorable speech impediments: “chicken-a-lay,” “my cant like dat,” “am-bah-lance,” and my newest favorite: MIPPLES!

    Reply
  2. Christina 11 May 2012 at 10:33 am

    I get so attached to the things my kids say too. I love that my 20 month old says “hold you” and my son say “free dem” meaning three of them but using it when he means both of them or all of them, anything more than one. I’ll be sad to see it go.

    Reply
  3. Chantelle 11 May 2012 at 11:16 am

    So cute! I am also in the same boat as you, except my girl has 1 month of preschool left. But the thought of her entering into kindergarten…beginning a life of schooling is so hard to wrap my head around!!
    She is actually a super good speaker and doesn’t say many words incorrectly, EXCEPT for cupcake! She says puccake. It doesn’t matter how many times I correct her, she is convinced she is saying exactly like me… oh well!

    All the best to you and Oliver in the next phase :) so cute.

    Reply
  4. Carole 11 May 2012 at 11:24 am

    When my son was little he said “f” for the “tr” sound. It wasn’t so cute when he tried to say “truck” so we quickly (very quickly) started working on the “tr” sound. ;)

    Reply
  5. Amy 11 May 2012 at 12:14 pm

    When my oldest was a toddler, he would call me “Monny”. And I loved it! His own special name for me! It made me so sad the day he learned to say Mommy correctly.

    Reply
  6. Ashley 11 May 2012 at 12:40 pm

    I just wrote a long comment then got an error, not sure if you got it! my kids (8 and 5) say merote instead of remote and my 5 year old goes tomango instead of comando (she used to after an accident while we were out if not clean panties were available) This makes me think of so many of the cute things they used to say they have now grown out of!

    Reply
  7. Stacy 11 May 2012 at 12:44 pm

    My now 9-year-old son Jacob used to do the same thing Oliver does–replace his th- sounds with f-sounds–but he did grow out of it (sniff sniff). He sometimes replaced th- sounds with a d- sound as well, which we thought was really cute. We would always get him to say “I’m Larry, this is my brother Darryl, and my other brother Darryl” which would come out, “I’m Larry, this is my brudder Darryl, and my udder brudder Darryl.” He had no idea why we thought it was so cute, but he would say it on command.

    I also think it’s cute the way my almost-2-year-old son pronounces Jacob (“Jay-Jub”). When he wants something from him, it’s “Peeeeas Jay-Jub?” (Please, Jacob?).

    Reply
  8. alyssa 11 May 2012 at 1:23 pm

    Awwww! He’s growing up, mama! I’ve never really corrected my children’s pronunciations. Eventually, they go away. My son had a lot of speech issues when he was younger, and it drove family nuts that I didn’t correct his every. single. word. (and it was pretty much every word). They were sweet. But it turns out, he couldn’t hear (after years of his ped. saying he could), and after a set of tubes, every speech issue went away within 6 months. Now I miss those sweet Taytin’s (Kaitlyn), Yuv you’s (love you) and others. He’s 8, and still says am-blee-ance, and I smile and don’t say a word!

    Reply
  9. Mindy 11 May 2012 at 2:19 pm

    school over already? my son still has a little over a month to go! my son does not have a lot of words, but my favorite is the way he say’s the number 7…it’s “ah ha” :)

    Reply
  10. Christine 11 May 2012 at 3:22 pm

    Man, it feels like forever ago that he started preschool! Big kid! Big kindergartener!

    You know that Charlotte has the dutchiest (is that rude? that’s the only way I’ve heard to describe it) speech in the world. Girl’s a walking example of childhood lisps and speech foibles. She has no idea she can’t say her r’s–gets indignant if we try and correct her. Oh well, for now.

    Reply
  11. Ashley Buchanan 11 May 2012 at 3:58 pm

    My now 8 year old started saying foremember instead of remember. we finally got her to say it correctly but she passed the word down to our 4 year old (who sadly is going into K this year too!). Time flies I still can’t believe I will two out of our three kids in school! We correct him but its so cute, so it makes it hard!
    Happy Mother’s Day (early)

    Reply
  12. Jenny 11 May 2012 at 8:18 pm

    My Josh (my oldest) is graduating preschool next week, then he too will officially be a K’er He also struggles with the “th” sound, replacing it with “d” most of the time. We’ve started working on it pretty hard. And if I think about kindergarten too much, I start humming “Sunrise, sunset…wasn’t it yesterday when they were young” over and over!

    Reply
  13. Sarah-Anne 11 May 2012 at 8:18 pm

    when in the world did he get so big?! he is so proud of himself and you should be too mama for raising such a great little boy with a great personality!

    Reply
  14. Vanessa 11 May 2012 at 9:58 pm

    My 36 year old sister still says “purt” instead of “put” because my dad chose not to correct it. Not so cute. Thankfully, I got made fun of for the same thing in elementary school and was able to correct it.

    Reply
  15. Sarah 11 May 2012 at 10:08 pm

    Ah, yes! I love those little errors, I call is the baby that is still clinging on. I hate to see those go, my current favorite is hims in place of his.

    Kindergarten! Good to see them growing, but it’s painful sometimes. My oldest is in 1st, that K year about did this overly protective Mommy in. :) We both grew a TON that year. And while painful, it was so very good for us, looking at it from this side that is. :)

    Every step forward is good, we see how we can grow and watch our littles handle more and grow more and more into the big person they will become. What a blessing! :)

    Reply
  16. Ashley 11 May 2012 at 11:16 pm

    Oh sweet boy!!!

    Brynlee used to call asparagus “ti-bis”. Then, one day in the grocery store I held up a bunch of asparagus and asked her what it was, just to hear her say it again. She looked at me like I had 4 heads and said “A-per-a-dus”. Saddest day!

    Reply
  17. Hilary Farris 12 May 2012 at 5:02 am

    Time does go so fast! My “baby” boy will be 17 this year and will start his Junior year of high school in the fall. When he was little he would say ” hep-da-docter” for helicopter. To hear his sweet baby voice say that was the best! It was hard for me to let him outgrow it. My girls, one is 14 and the other is 9, both said “lel-low” for yellow. So sweet!

    Reply
  18. Beth 12 May 2012 at 4:22 pm

    My youngest uses a ‘g’ for a lot of words. Grammiches, gwucks, and all sorts of other things. I sometimes correct her, but it’s cute!

    Reply
  19. Groovy 14 May 2012 at 6:52 am

    I am noticing how much Oliver has grown in just 9 months! If he is in standing in front of the same post,

    check out the lines on the post-2-3 inches?? He definitely looks taller!! Just a grandma observing…..love

    you, Oliver!

    Reply
  20. Rachel 14 May 2012 at 7:42 am

    Raechel-

    Oliver is so cute and big and wonderful! Ugh! If only I knew where to begin with the speech thing. My guy, after two years of speech therapy, still is very hard to understand and communicate with for others. He has gotten used to me interpreting and translating for him because it’s the only means of communicating some days. Can you imagine how frustrating it is for someone always saying, “What’d you say?” after everything you spoke? We are working on it, but it’s been slow. He does have some cute words, but instead of relishing in the cute, I just worry they stem from a much bigger issue. He is just perfect to me and is now all signed up for basketball and tennis for the summer. Hopefully, his coaches will be ready to play! :)

    And, yes! Regan is off to Kindergarten in the fall. Saaaaay what?

    Reply
  21. JCF 14 May 2012 at 11:14 am

    Awww…he’s so big!

    My oldest is 4.5, and we’re starting Kindergarten in the fall (Kindergarten). He also says “fank you,” which we’ve been working on a little as we do our reading lessons. When we’re sounding out a word with “th,” we work on really saying it. He’s doing pretty well when he’s concentrating, but I’m also sad to see it go.

    My 3 year old said “ba-lah-lah” for banana up until recently, though she was perfectly capable of saying it. My 4.5 year old said “rabby-rits” for vitamins, long after he was capable of saying it. My youngest (almost 2) calls dogs “wuh-wuh” or “woofy,” and I swear my heart will break the day I hear him say “dog.”

    Oh, and my 3 year old used to say “What a diraster!” for “What a disaster!” all the time. I actually cried the first time she said “disaster.”

    Reply
  22. Pam Sands 6 September 2013 at 10:35 pm

    My four year old used to say, “Can I have a snack from the chicken?” The day he finally said kitchen I was so sad and he was very proud of himself. He also still says fermember? He still has the yegs and yegos. Those L’s sure are tough.

    Reply
    • raechelm 7 September 2013 at 9:13 am

      aw, that’s so sweet!! Oliver is almost 7 now, and when he’s not thinking, he still gets his “th” sounding a lot like an “f”. He’ll straighten it out :)

      Reply

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