Braden's Last Day of Elementary School: June 2nd

Emma's graduation was quickly followed by Braden's last day at Monte Vista Elementary School. I was already a blubbering mess with Emma's graduation. Braden's milestone did not help. 

I moved Braden and Molly to Monte Vista from Eastlake in 2019. A friend of mine from bookclub mentioned that she was thinking of moving her kids there to help with the transition to Junior High. A vast majority of the Eastlake kids do not go to South Jordan Middle School, and so Emma and Macey really walked into Junior High only knowing a few people. I always joked that Emma knew three people total and one of them was the lunch lady. If I moved Molly and Braden to Monte Vista, they would go to Junior High knowing a lot of the kids.

This friend never made the move, she actually decided to take her kids out of Chinese Immersion and opted to send her kids to the local school. But another neighbor came with me, and I was excited to have a carpool, if only for two years.

Molly really struggled with the move for a few weeks. She would call crying and asking to come home and said that she could not understand her teacher's Chinese at all. I think her anxiety just made her shut down completely to the point where she could not understand a word being said or taught. But she got an award in 5th grade and started to make friends and had really great teachers. It ended up being a good experience.

Braden also had a good experience, though he'll never admit to it. His third grade Chinese teacher was really hard on him and loved to keep him in during recess to work on math but luckily for him he had her during Covid so he didn't have a full year of her. He found good friends and a complete obsession with four square. Braden can talk about four square for a very long time and all elementary school drama seemed to center on four square: who lost the ball on the roof, who cut in line, who purposefully tried to get him out, etc., etc.

My favorite part of Monte Vista was how easy it was to do drop-offs and pick-ups compared to Eastlake. The church made it easy to park and pick up and the neighborhood made for much speedier returns home. I'm glad we made the move, and I am sad to see this part of our lives end.