Book Post for the first Tuesday we're "back at school"..

Our first day of First Grade went pretty well
here in the Garden State. Princess woke up refreshed and ready to go
and quite early for her. We got dressed and packed up some bags and headed off to the bank,
then Burger King (her choice- they have a play area) for breakfast. There were actually two boys there
when we arrived, so they all played together..I'm guessing they are homeschooled, they were on a road trip with their family, and when the one brother saw her up in the play area.."hey, there's a girl here!"..the other brother scrambled over introduced himself, asked if she wanted to play "dragons" and when she said yes, he said "here's your sword", and off they went to play until the boys were called down to leave.The swords were imaginary,
the squeals of joy were entirely real! We ate breakfast and then opened our books and had two of our lessons there in the deserted play area of the Burger King with the sun shining in on us and very light music playing quietly in the background.It went very well, and I think we will do it again. I have been holding a couple of B&N gift cards for a while, so we hit the store up on our way back up the highway. The lady who was working the children's section asked her what grade she was in and where she went to school. Princess said,"I don't go to school," and before another word was out the lady asked.."oh, you're homeschooling? Have you seen our homeschool section? We have several homeschoolers on staff here, so we have been expanding our offerings."
Then she gave us a list of their story times (I think it's Wednesday mornings) and told me she would be more than happy to put together a list of books for us.
We read a great picture book by and about Dionne Warwick.

It is all about how she found her gift for singing.It comes with a cd too with two songs,
Jesus Loves Me and Say a Little Prayer.
They were having a special on Halloween themed books, so Princess picked out three,
Happy Halloween Little Critter,
She reads me a Little Critter book every night before bed.
Charlie and Lola Boo! I Can Make You Jump.,
It is hard to go wrong with a Charlie and Lola book, yes we read them with the accent. ;-)

There Was an Old Women Who Swallowed a Bat.
This was not nearly as good as I Know an Old Lady Who Swallowed a Pie..which we could not find.
I tried to convince her to get In November instead, but it was her special "back to school" treat, so I backed off.
They came with a free Trick or Treat bag..she was delighted. Next we drove to the post office to pick up stamps
and mail a couple invitations for her upcoming 6th Birthday Party and mail a little something to Gabe and Sam.
Then we hit the library. It was so nice and quiet. We had a snack in the cafe, while thumbing through a couple of magazines, and then headed over to the young children's section. There was no one there, so she played on the computer while I picked out a couple of books. Then we hit up the "science books"...that's where it all went horribly wrong. Suddenly we were engaged in what could only be called a battle of whits. I was looking for a couple of specific books, and Princess was filling my bag with every book she found..three on Mars...several math books, books about the earth. Our bag was too full and heavy to move, and I didn't have the books on my "list' yet. We were arguing in the science book section of the library! Can you imagine? Did I mention there were now people showing up..where it had been empty before? Can you imagine what you would have thought about me as a mother if you had heard us from the other side of the stacks..."You cannot keep putting all those books in my bag!'
"but I NEED to know about Mars!!" "we have enough books already..they are still holding some for us at the desk! ,"But I NEED to learn all about my earth!!" "Pu those back" "No! I NEED this book too!!"
"You can't have every book you want..just because you want it!" "Why not? You are so unfair..you don't want to let me learn anything!!"

Can you imagine? I'd like to say we resolved it well enough to leave with dignity and the other patrons believing that I was a good and kind and thoughtful Mother, but...the truth is even I did not believe it at that point.
We left the stacks after my threatening her that this would be the last time she comes to the library until she can drive herself if she doesn't behave, and went back over to the young children's section. There were some children there now (toddlers), so she played with and read to a couple and then we left. We did stop to rent Nim's Island
and I wanted to rent Horton Hears a Who, but they did not have it.Princess picked out Shark Boy and Lava Girl (again) and we went home for lunch and she watched it.
We read our books after that and cleaned up a bit and did a little math and it was time for Farmer Dad to come home. We picked raspberries and I got to work on saving seeds from a bunch of tomatoes, got more ready for processing, enjoyed having one table without tomatoes, and he comes inside with more! Two baskets more!!
I'm not blaming him exactly, but one day with an empty table is it too much to ask? Oh well.
I have to get off and go can now. I will post about the books we got from the library tomorrow.
The stack is HUGE!! ;-)