Jack Graduated from Totten Hall!! :-(

Well, after 2 yrs, the day finally came…Jack graduated from Totten Hall Preschool!! He was so excited and they practiced so hard to prepare. I was dreading it and took a box of Kleenex’s! I had helped set up the night before so KC Bennett went over and reserved seats for us that night so we had great seats!! I went early and then Mom, Katie, Jan, Jeff and the girls and Dad followed closely behind. As soon as the music started playing for them to walk in in their little green caps and gowns, I started getting teary-eyed. I just couldn’t believe Jack was that old. They sang several sweet songs and Jack was all smiles. Once done with the songs, all the classes sat down except for Mrs. Virden/Mrs. Wheatley’s. They then asked the mother of each child to come up front and get in line down the center aisle. The children all had large flowers made of tissue paper to give us. I was about 4th in line and was fighting tears so hard just waiting my turn. As I stepped up and Jack came down, I knelt down and he hugged me and gave me my flower. I cried and told him how much I loved him. We went back to our seats and the children then got their diplomas. Again, Jack was all smiles. He couldn’t have been any happier. After their class was all done, they sat down and each class went through the same routine. After all classes were done, they played a very emotional slideshow of pictures with 2 songs playing in the background. Not sure what the first one was but the second one was “Let Them Be Little” by Billy Dean. I was sobbing through it. The pictures were so sweet and really showed how special Totten Hall really is. Well, when the lights came back on, Mom said to me “Missy, Jack is crying.” I went up to check on him and he was crying so hard. They were going back to the altar to sing 2 more songs. Jack said “Mommy, I can’t do it” and I told him he could and hugged him tight. He went up there and sang the last 2 songs just sobbing with his shoulders going up and down. After the 2 songs, they went out and then came back in for pictures. He was still crying when he came back in and Mrs. Virden said that he said "I can't leave Totten Hall because that's where all my friends and family are." It broke my heart. He’s such an emotional child and truly gets so upset. I think it was the sad song on the video just like with Mom’s retirement party but he could not stop crying. We took several pictures afterwards with him looking so sad. We then headed over to the Parish Hall for a reception where he livened up. He had cake and punch and then got presents from Grandma and Papaw and Grammie. He was very excited about that. He kept telling me “Mommy, I tried so hard not to cry but just couldn’t help it.” I felt so bad for him. I just wanted to go home and snuggle with him and ask God to please stop the growing up process now! But, instead of doing that, I rushed them home to stay with Jan (Mom had to go do something with her Mom) and rushed them in the door and ran out to get to work. When I got to work, I just cried because I had such regret for doing that and not just taking the day off. It just made it seem like any other day and it wasn't. We did take them to Chuck E Cheese's last night and told the worker girl that we were there celebrating Jack's graduation so he was pretty excited about that. Sometimes I just hate working and always being in a hurry...hard day! Needless to say, it was a very hard, emotional day but Jack is now very excited about Kindergarten at Newburgh Elementary and being a Wildcat! He’s going in the mornings and his teacher is Mrs. Faulkenberg. He passed his Lollipop screening with flying colors (and of course was the first one done!). The next Friday after graduation, Jack and I made a “chain” to count down the days to Kindergarten just like they do at school. That day, he only had 95 days to go! He’s getting so big…it’s sad!!!!!!!