Tea for Ten

Last week Meredith’s class had their Mothers’ Tea. It’s sort of their graduation from the Mom’s Day Out program into full-on preschool. They serve age-appropriate desserts, sing a few songs, and present a little slideshow of their year. I could remember sitting through Alex’s vividly, so it was a jolt of reality to realize Meredith--my baby—is headed for preschool.

The singing was the best part. They were semi-well-rehearsed, and eager to perform. Meredith’s class is overwhelmingly girly. I think there are three boys out of the ten kids in the class. One boy cried, one boy was missing, and one boy was not thrilled to participate.

As I was getting Meredith ready for her day at school, she looked at me with a giant red bow perched on her curls and said, “I hope everyone wears bows today.” I asked her why and she said, “MOM! It’s Mothers’ Tea! I want everyone’s hair to look good!” Jennifer and I laugh about how I wound up with a fashion forward daughter and she wound up with one who has a love of words. Jennifer told me a story about Caroline’s use of the word, “improvise,” in a completely correct context and that lead to another one of our conversations. I swear Meredith and Jenn could shop for a week while Caroline and I sat on a bench and waited for them in our black pants, long sleeved t-shirts, and Crocs. Maybe God gave each of us a little of the other to make living far apart a little easier. I like to think so at least.