Amara's class graduated from Pre-School this week. However, since Amara makes the Kindergarten cut off by only 10 days, we've decided not to start her in Kindergarten this fall and rather wait until next year. The result: her class graduated, but she and a handful of others didn't. They had a big ceremony and party after school on Tuesday. We didn't go to the ceremony, because we didn't think Amara would do well seeing her friends up there and she couldn't go. She's already saying "My friend and I won't be friends anymore because she's going to Kindergarten and I'm not" -- some days she even cries that she's losing her friends. So we just didn't think her attending the ceremony would be a good idea.

Instead, we tried to convince her that "Graduation" was going out to eat to a special restaurant all dressed up with your family and getting a bike. We started to do all of that...but she wasn't convinced. She really wanted to go to the party.

So we gave her the option of "party" or "bike" on Tuesday, assuring her that she would get a bike -- it just wouldn't be that night. She chose the party. So we went back to the school and went to the party -- which was actually very good -- much more than I expected!. They had ponies, balloon clowns, face painting, bounce houses, a dunk tank, and then the kids got to share their rooms / open house style with us. It was really nicely done.

The kids had a blast. I'd share the bounce house photos -- but they're awful blurry! Instead, you'll have to settle for their first ride on a horse. They thought that was pretty cool! And their balloons -- Amara's is a butterfly (which happens to look identical to the bat the clown made for a little boy), and Dominic's is a pirate hat. Um.... OK. :) They popped by the time we got to the car, so oh well!