What do they DO all day?

My eldest son is at 'school' nursery - this is the bit they do before they go into the first year of 'proper' school. They go there for 2.5 hours a day and seem to have a lot of fun but doing what I really don't know.

I am (slightly) obsessed with what they get up to. I LOVED the primary part of my education and it makes me quite excited to even go into a primary school every day so I'm pretty keen to know what they've been doing (as secretly I'd love to do it all again).

Maybe I was lucky but I just loved all that stuff - the 'nature table' and doing crazy paintings and nativity plays and weird trips to draw tadpoles and kiss chase and the day the house next door to the school caught light and we were invaded by fireman..... So I REALLY want to know what he's been doing all day.

Only I forget.

I'm a woman.

He is a man (well boy).

You know how it is. A bloke can spend 4 hours deep in conversation with his mates and you say 'how are they? what's the goss?' and he says 'yeah, Ok'.

You're say 'but what did you talk about?'.

They are like 'erm, you know, this and that......'.

Well it's the same with my son and nursery.

Me: 'Did you have a good day?'..

Him: 'Yes'.

Me: 'What did you do!?'.

Him: 'Just nothing'.

Me: 'Don't be daft - you did loads! Did you go outside?'.

Him: 'I can't remember'.

Me: 'What story did you have?'.

Him: 'I just can't remember'.

And so it goes on. And today I get a letter announcing that he will soon progress to 'proper' school and will be spending days over in the Reception class and I realise that nursery days will be over, forever, and I still won't really know what on earth he's been doing in there for the last year. And that makes me a (little) bit sad. To coin a very overused, yet true, phrase 'it goes so fast'.

Sometimes, if I ask very specific questions, I get some kind of an answer but then I (often) find myself wondering what on earth I'm having an insight into.

3 examples in the last week:.

1.
Me: 'Did you play in the vets' today?' (they have a lovely pretend vets set up in the corner of the class room complete with things like a door intercom and pretend drugs - THE THRILL! I would have loved this. In fact aged about 7 I did actually set up a pretend vets' in my bedroom wardrobe. I remember collecting empty Lilets tampon packets to use as medicine boxes and being utterly confused by mum not embracing this as a jolly marvelous idea).

Him: 'Yes'.

Me: (secretly overjoyed I've got an actual response from him) 'What did you do in there?'.

Him: 'I threw all the animals out the window.

Me: 'Oh.

2.
Me: 'It says in your home journal that it's Friendship Week and you need to get me to write a message to a special friend. Who would you like me to write a message to?.

Him: 'Casey'.

Me: 'Casey. Lovely. Do you play with Casey a lot?'.

Him: 'No. She's not kind. She hits all the other children. Always'.

Me: 'Oh'.

Him: 'My friend is Sophia'.

Me: 'OK lovely. What would you like to write to Sophia?'.

Him: 'I really like her hair'.

Me: 'That is LOVELY'.

Him: 'Yes I love the way she has hair all on her back.....'.

Me: 'Oh. Is there anything else you can tell me about her?.......'.

Him: 'Yes, she sits very still when I tell her all about how diesel trains work'.

Me: 'I bet she does' (she's probably asleep).

3.
Me: 'Wow! You've got a sticker! What is it for?'.

Him: 'Letters and sounds'.

Me: 'That sounds good! What did you do?'.

Him: 'My teacher jumped over a river and then we all jumped over the rive and then the teacher held me up so high that I made a hole in the roof and boomed through it and had to spend the rest of the day on the roof'.

Me: 'Is that true or a bit of a fib?'.

Him: 'Mummy? Why are you crying?'

Me: 'I'm not. I'm laughing' (because if I didn't, I would cry).

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