Olivia's First Day of Kindergarten

Can you believe Olivia is old enough to be starting school? Where has the time gone? We actually could have held Liv back a year since her birthday is in August. The cut off date is August 31st. If they are not 5 by that date they have to wait until the next year to start. So, Olivia will be one the very youngest in her class. I felt that she was ready to go this year though.
Anyway... the story...
Olivia has a lot of anxiety when it comes to new things. It doesn't seem to matter how excited she is for things, when the time comes she freaks out because it is something she has never done before. So, I some what expected starting school would be hard for her. We went to back to school night to meet her teacher. It started with 40 minutes of crying when I suggested going into her class room to meet her teacher. It ended fine though when she finally did go in. Her teacher was so sweet and gave her a big hug. Liv decided she REALLY liked her teacher and wasn't scared to start school.
Well, the actual day came. She told me that morning she decided she didn't want to go. She was set on the idea that she wasn't ready and she would rather be home with Claire and Emma. I was racking my brain thinking of SOME way to get her in school without a big crying scene. I asked her if she would make a deal with me. She said yes! The deal was that she would TRY kindergarten and if she didn't like it I would sign her up for pre-school again. She happily got ready for school and got excited again.
We went over to the school, liv happily walked in, until she saw the play ground FULL of children and parents. She stopped dead in her tracks and said "I AM NOT GOING!" She started crying and telling me there were too many kids. We sat on the sidewalk while everyone passed us by making comments like "Yea for Kindergarten!" Liv sat there crying and trying to talk it out for about 15 minutes and by the time she was done crying all the kids were inside starting school. I was out of ideas so I said whatever and said she could come home and we would try again later. We started walking back when she decided that she wanted to look into the window of her class to see just how many children were there. So, we went to look in the window.
We looked in, she decided there was indeed just too many kids. The class was sitting on the floor listening to the teacher. She was passing out name tags. She had 1 left and couldn't figure out where her last student was. She saw us out in the hall watching and she came to get Olivia. She says to me "I know it is hard to leave her, but it is best if you just leave" She takes Olivia and Livie starts screaming at the top of her lungs while she grabs me with a death grip. She is crying "no Mom, don't go! No! I don't want to go to Kindergarten!" So, I start crying and the teacher is telling me "we have your phone number if we need you, just go!" I am crying like a baby trying to pry Olivia off me. Finally I get away and Liv gets pulled into the class room. I didn't know what to do, and since Emma was at home waiting to be fed I just went home. It was awful leaving Liv like that! I couldn't help but wonder why out of 30 children I had to have the one and only that screamed and cried when I left.
So, finally 3:30 rolls around and I go pick up Olivia. She came out happy and smiling. Apparently after about 10 minutes of crying Liv finally calmed down. She later warmed up and had some fun. She told me she really like school and was excited to go back. She has went back happily ever since! It is a good thing because I don't know how much crying I could handle! She is really liking school now and is making new friends every day. That first day was quite awful though ;)