Cucumber Letters and Pride

We played with our food today.

Tomorrow is Eli's first day of preschool.  Since he is a really young five-year old, this is his second year doing preschool, so there are not as many unknowns, but it's still a big day for us.  I had grand plans at the beginning of the summer to work with Eli every day while Abby was napping.  I even have a copy of this book all ready to go:

Let's just say...it didn't happen.  I have kind of felt today like I am cramming for a final...checking to see which letters Eli can remember and hoping it's enough to show that he did actually learn something during his first year of preschool.  Poor kid, if we didn't do school stuff over the past weeks, I could have at least let him enjoy his last day of summer.  The cramming continued as we got out our magnetic letters and I quizzed Eli while making lunch.

Love these!

Today for lunch, I happened to be cutting cucumbers into strips, as opposed to our usual circles.  With "letter recognition" and "fit a summer's worth of learning into one day" on my brain, I saw letters when I looked at the cutting board.

I would make letters for the kids and they would tell me (HOPEFULLY) what they were.

Turns out that you can make a lot of letters with cucumber strips.

When we got around to actually eating lunch, I asked Eli to make some letters for me.
Where you see the arrow, he bit off a piece to make this "F."  It was fun to watch his thought process.

"Mom, just let me eat, please."

With another chomp, the "E" from the previous picture becomes another "F."

And...not to be outdone by her brother...

The results of our cramming?  He knows most, but certainly not all of his letters.  If I am really honest with myself, I am afraid that this will make me look bad.  He has the same teachers this year and THEY will know what HE knows (or doesn't know) and then his teachers will know what his mother did (or did not do) with him over the summer.  I am thankful for another reminder today (in line with years and years of reminders) of the prideful state of my heart and thankful for God's mercy to me.  So tomorrow, without even knowing how many numbers he can identify, I will send off my sweet boy to preschool.  No more cramming today...