Sleeping On The Floor

So I thought I had scheduled everything just right.  I made sure IKEA was delivering our mattresses on the day that we arrived.  I let the building manager know, I let the doorman know.  In case they arrived before we did, I didn't want anything to go wrong.  That's when things went wrong.  As soon as we got off the plane and turned our phones back on I had 5 missed calls.  Our doorman (one I hadn't alerted to our delivery) had turned our mattresses away.  He told the delivery people they were too big for him to sign for and they couldn't get a hold of us so I had to reschedule the delivery...for next Tuesday.  Finally, something went wrong with this move.

But then we arrived at our building and our apartment is gorgeous.  TINY but gorgeous.  We have views that are not to be believed.  Even on a grey day.  I can only imagine how beautiful it will be when the weather warms up and things start to bloom.  The above photo was taken at sunrise the following morning when I woke up at the crack of dawn because we were all sleeping together on what rugs and towels and blankets we could find to pile up on each other to create a mattress.  That's the Hudson River.

On our first full day we went straight to our new school to meet with the Parent Coordinator and get registered and shown around.  We discovered that if we go out the back door of our building and cut through a parking lot, we're there!  A 4 minute commute depending on how many stops the elevator makes.  And school doesn't even start until 8:40!  Ooh, this makes me happy.  Our mornings have been SO much better than they were in San Mateo.  No more fighting in the morning and rushing around.  We have a leisurely breakfast, get dressed and the kids still have play time.  I've even showered EVERY morning this week!  A record for me since having kids!

The school is pretty great.  The classroom doors are all painted in Jelly Bean colors.  There's an auditorium, a gymnasium (with 2 full time gym teachers), an art room (with a full time art teacher), a computer lab with all brand new iMacs (and a full time computer teacher), a music room with a grand piano (and a full time music teacher).  I'm blown away by how much staff there is here.  On top of all that every class has elective classes that are given during the school day, not after school.  Ella's class just finished Chess and Holden's will start it next.  Ella needed to be evaluated to make sure her Spanish was up to their second grade level.  The teacher said her Spanish was "beautiful".  Ella never stops surprising me.  She comes across as so shy and reserved but when the Spanish teacher said she needed to take her to the classroom by herself to evaluate her, Ella just popped up and walked with her and never looked back at us.  When I asked her after if she spoke Spanish to the teacher she said, "Of course mom, I speak both languages."  I was so proud of her.

While Holden wasn't as excited to get back to school (any school at all after 5 weeks off), he also took it all in stride.  He seemed to enjoy the time we spent in his classroom observing.  His class had just gone on a field trip the day before to see Seussical and they took the subway!  I love it.  Apparently they average about one field trip a month at this school!  We're not in California anymore.

So what were by far my biggest fears about this move - how the kids would handle it and if their school would be good - have been alleviated.  We've now been at the school a week and all four of us couldn't be happier.  Such a relief.