As the school year winds down, we find ourselves more often than not at Muscota celebrating one thing or another and preparing our summer goodbyes.  It’s particularly bittersweet for us since Huck and his classmates have been with their teacher Marilyn for two years now, and come September they’ll walk up three flights of stairs to their brand new second grade teacher. Monday was the fourth and final Family Breakfast with Marilyn’s class, and though most of us were too busy handing out homemade thank you cards and making sure hugs and kisses were given to everyone in the room, I could feel the change in the air.  For one thing, hanging from the ceiling were the children’s thoughts for next year.  For another, before school that morning Huck sat in his bedroom with the door shut as he wrote the world’s sweetest love letter to one of his seven girlfriends who was leaving for the summer immediately following Family Breakfast.  (The other day he told me it would be easier for him to list the ones who aren’t his girlfriends.)  To prove that I am now a very respectful mother in this social networking world, I am resisting posting the letter that I immediately scanned into our computer.  I will, however, tell you that he called her his “GFF (Hopefully)” and that he wrote these super romantic lyrics to one of his favorite songs: “Hey ho, nobody home.  Meat nor drink nor money have I none.  Still I will be merry!  Hey ho.”  And lastly, because Troy and Huck reenacted their first-day-of-kindergarten picture and made me once again aware of how Huck is practically ready for graduate school.

Hey ho!

Then and now …