Owen’s Thanksgiving Feast

All the kindergarten classes were having a combined Thanksgiving Feast today. We had all signed up to bring something and Owen really wanted us to come, so I kept Katie up from her nap and off we went.

To say it was all a bit disorganized would be an understatement. I joked that at least it wasn’t a state dinner—it was just a kindergarten meal. 🙂 The feast was supposed to start at 1:45 and at 1:35 the last of the kids were still eating while parents and teachers were cleaning the empty tables and taping colored paper tablecloths on. No one knew which teachers were going to sit where so all these parents had no place to put their food donations and just kept moving them around.

Katie was being good, actually, and kept herself busy with an acorn she had scooped up on the way in. And then playing with my Visitor sticker.

Then I realized that parents were just making plates ahead of time and putting them on the tables—so the kids wouldn’t even get to pick what they wanted. I knew Owen wouldn’t eat any of it (except maybe the corn and a roll) so I had packed his lunch. But with all the confusion (and seeing that their class assistant was running around setting up), I was positive the lunch would not make it to the cafeteria. I asked her if it was okay to get his lunch and she said yes, so I had to take Katie to the classroom. The classroom was dark so I figured the kids were all being held somewhere beforehand. So it was a quick grab, but I was glad I did it because I got to see the other turkeys that had been disguised! 🙂

On the way back to the cafeteria, I saw all the kids in a lower hallway with their feather headdresses and pilgrim hats. Owen saw me and got very happy. Katie, of course, wanted to go down and sit with Owee. 🙂 Back in the cafeteria, Katie wanted to hide.

The centerpieces:

I grabbed these entrance pictures from the school’s Facebook page. Each kid walked in with a “friend” from another class, so each Native American walked in with a Pilgrim.

Then it was time to line up for the exchange of necklaces:

And then the first few songs. Things seemed to be going as expected. Owen was happy and laughing.

Then the singing started. And he saw me. Remember his meltdown/panic attack last year when he was line leader for his pre-K graduation? Yeah, it wasn’t a one-time thing. I do not have a public performer. And I could slowly see it happening—he was getting shy and starting to tear up and definitely wasn’t participating. I’m not sure if it was performing in front of a big crowd or seeing me or a combination of both…but it killed me to watch.

Here’s exactly what I saw. Poor kid.

And then it was over and he got to come sit down to eat lunch and he was fine.

But he REFUSED to put his hat back on so I just took a picture of it.

And by then, all the plates of food the parents had set out were ice cold. Which didn’t really bother Owen as he was eating PB&J—though he did have three bites of corn and a roll. I picked at the rest of the plate but it wasn’t very appealing cold.

While everyone was eating, they were playing a slideshow of drawings the kids had done in the computer lab.

This was Owen’s:

The music teacher came up while Owen was eating and asked him what was wrong because she saw how he had been acting. She told me that he was amazing in class and loved to sing!

They had a second set of songs planned for after lunch so I tried to tell him that he didn’t need to be shy and that he just needed to look straight at me and pretend that no one else was there…and that I really really wanted to see him sing and I knew he could sing the songs because he sings them at home all the time. He would barely even look at me or acknowledge what I was saying! He said he didn’t want to do them and wanted to come home with me. I told him that wasn’t an option. I told him again if he was scared to just look straight at me and don’t pay any attention to anyone else. I got him to laugh a bit and kept my fingers crossed.

Lining up—so far so good.

And then he actually participated in the closing songs! Without melting down! YAY! I’m guessing it was more luck of the draw then my pep talk but I’ll take it. 🙂

Proof I was there! (I found this pic on Facebook afterwards!)

Heading back to class!