Choosing a school for Sumayah

Sumayah started her very first day at nursery school yesterday. The build up to this was very stressful for me, only because last week I was frantically phoning around trying to find a suitable school! She was already enrolled in a school for 2012, the same school Bilaal attended before grade R, but we realised quite late in December that there would be some logistical issues with this school. See Bilaal is at a government school, while the preschool follows private school terms. Also, with Bilaal in grade 1 this year, he has to be at school at 7h30 already, while the preschool only opens at 7h30. Now normally this wouldnt be a problem because I could take her to school at 8h30, but with a baby 'pending', means I would be out of action for bit, so Yaasier would have to drop Bilaal then back up on himself to drop Sumayah then back past Bilaal's school to get to work! And then the most compelling aspect of all...the fees. We would now have 2 sets of fees to pay and the preschool fees were way more than when Bilaal was there in 2010. So as soon as the new year arrived the search was on. Many of the schools were still closed so I couldn't find out if they had space or have a visit till finally I had 3 possibles to visit on monday and tuesday this week. I couldn't sleep sunday or monday night, hoping and praying that I would love at least one of the schools. Its such a huge responsibility I feel choosing the right nursery school, because the kids are so little and can't fully communicate yet if theres a problem. I also feel I want them to have a positive first experience of school. So the monday I went to see the first two schools and liked it alot, but was not instinctively excited about either one. This disappointed me because it wasn't good enough and I didn't like that I was relying on the third school which I would be visiting the next day. With Bilaal's preschool when we were selecting a school for him, when we left there both Yaasier and I just knew it would be the right choice so this is the feeling I was looking for in choosing Sumayah's school. I had a chat with a good friend who went through this ordeal not too long ago with her own child and she reminded me of advice I in fact gave her at the time, which was, that there is no such thing as a perfect school, only one that is right for you and your child. Then tuesday finally arrived and voila! The minute I stepped onto the grounds I just knew. Its hard to explain because its not based on anything tangible, like the appearance of the grounds, although these things only confirmed my instincts as I looked around. Its just a sense you get from the staff and the the way they run the school just fitted in with what makes me feel comfortable. And then finally the school also ticked all the logistical boxes, so of course its not the perfect school, but I felt it was the right one. I especially knew by the fact that I was actually excited to phone hubby and tell him all about it. So we took home all the forms and she was to start the very next day, but that's a story for another post.