"It's always harder on the parents," the nice woman in the school's office assured me. She guessed correctly that the panicked caller — me — was sending her first kid to kindergarten.

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Now that the first week is a wrap, I can start to breathe again. Joseph says he likes school — his favorite things are recess, snack and lunch. We made it through the week without using the spare set of clothes and with only a few tears. Here's a look at those first few days of kindergarten.

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I cheated a bit on the photo for that all-important "first day of kindergarten" Facebook post. I took the picture the day we met Joseph's teacher because technically, it was the first day of school. Plus, I knew we'd be stressed out and running late on the actual first day of kindergarten.

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Nearly every weekend this summer, while baby brother napped, Joseph and my husband hit the playground at his soon-to-be elementary school. We also took every kindergarten tour offered, and the new student tour to boot. I wanted Joseph to be ultra-comfortable in his new environment. This year, Seattle Public School introduced a family connections meeting for every incoming kindergartner, a half-hour with the teacher before starting school. It was great to have that one-on-one time and to explore the classroom without the chaos of 20 new students.

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Joseph's favorite thing in the world is birthdays. So we played it up, celebrating with a "Happy Kindergarten to You!" chocolate cake the night before, and greeting him with balloons at pickup.

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Joseph lives for meals (he's my child, after all). I'd been warned about how little the kids would eat at school, but I was still surprised by his full lunchbox at the end of the day.

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I reserved a stack of kindergarten books through the public library. Our favorite: "Mom, It's My First Day of Kindergarten!" by Hyewon Yum. The drawings and text are simple, and it addresses the fears and worries of a kindergartner and his mom. We also loved that the characters, with their dark hair and eyes, resembled our family.

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Our neighbor across the street, mom of a middle-schooler, remembered how scary that first day of kindergarten was. But just wait, she warned, until you drop off your daughter at her first dance.