Can you believe it is almost school time already?! I know some of you have already started school but we still have about another week before alarm clocks go off and backpacks are swung on. I love spending the summer with my girls but being the type A person that I am, when August hits, I always am ready to welcome back a schedule. I’m also ready for cooler weather! Today, I thought I’d share what we do to get ready for back to school. Doing these things always helps the start of school go a little smoother for all of us. 🙂
- Back To School Shopping
Probably my girls and I favorite thing to do in preparation for the school year is our day trip out of town for back to school shopping! But here is what I do to make it a little more enjoyable for myself:
A few years ago I started ordering all of the girls’ supplies on-line. The markers, crayons, paper, scissors- all of it. This is a GAME CHANGER. I mean, maybe it’s common sense, but I used to take all of the girls to the store and go up and down each aisle, trying to mark off each item as we went along. After about 10 minutes my brain would be a jumbled mess, I would start to get double vision and a mini panic attack would ensue sometime after. Kidding but only kind of. Literally though, with multiple kids, it gets real hectic, real fast. Now all of the “needed supplies” gets sent to our home and I go through the boxes in under 10 minutes.
Because of this, that means our back to school shopping entails clothes, shoes, book bags, makeup (you don’t have to ask me twice to go into Ulta) and whatever else they need. Much more fun in my opinion. We always make a whole day out of it, eat at a good restaurant and Matt typically comes with us as well and is always a good sport. (He still doesn’t understand how one can stay in Target for so long; not sure he will ever get it.) I know for me, one of my favorite memories was back to school shopping with my mom, and I hope the girls feel the same way when they are older!
2. Setting Up Homework Stations/De-cluttering
Towards the end of summer, I try to do an “end of summer” cleaning week. I have the girls de-clutter their rooms (things can get quite messy over summer) and set up their desks nice and neat. We also make sure all the alarm clocks are good to go. All three older girls have a desk in their room so they can do homework at their desks or a lot of times they will do it at the kitchen table or island. I go through shoes and clothes, having them get rid of anything that doesn’t fit or that they don’t like (I do this before back to school shopping so I know what they need). I re-stock pencils and pens (where they all go I do not know- along with my tape and scissors).
3. Make Perfume Rollers
Last week, we all made our own perfume rollers and they got to pick out their own customized scents using our essential oils. Something I have become more aware of over the years is all the toxic ingredients in our everyday products. My goal is to NOT be perfect and have everything natural but to make small, better choices overtime that will help our health.
The girls can easily bring these to school and it makes me feel better knowing they aren’t rolling toxic ingredients on themselves. You can buy rollers HERE. These are some of my favorite perfume blend ideas (my favorite is BRAVE):
4. Order Wellness Items
It never fails; once school starts and the air starts to get cooler someone always gets sick. And about that time is when I wish I had products on hand to help. This year, I made sure to stock up on everything early so it’s ready to go. Some of my favorite wellness products are:
- Thieves Essential Oil, Raven Essential Oil, R.C. Essential Oil, & Eucalyptus Essential Oil
- Thieves Hand Sanitizer (all the girls have one of these)
- Thieves Cough Drops (work SO good)
- Thieves Chest Rub (natural form of Vicks)
- Snifflease (great to diffuse for little ones if they have a stuffy nose)
- Kids Ibuprofen & Acetaminophen
- Tummygize Roller (my girls use this often as well as I)
- Breathe Again Roller (really helps open things up)
- Humidifier (a diffuser and humidifier are very different – buy my favorite one HERE )
- Ningxa Red (my wellness drink)
- Kid’s Probiotics (tastes like a pixie stick and girls LOVE them)
- Vitamin D Chewable Tablets (despise swallowing pills)
- Vitamin C Chewable Tablets (see above)
Easy Shopping! I put together my favorite items from this list for kids – Get a Kid’s Wellness Bundle HERE. You can add whatever else you want to your order; for new customers I’ll also send you a free diffuser along with recipe cards!
5. Schedule
Another thing that I’m sure most of you do, but I thought I’d still mention it. About a week or two before school begins we start putting the girls down earlier and waking them up earlier. This way, it’s not such a shock the first week of school! A little harder to do with older kids but we always make sure technology is out of the room by 9, along with phones, which charge in our bedroom.
The start of school is always exciting to me; the start of a new season! Hope you all have a wonderful, healthy, smooth start to the school year! And hopefully you can grab something helpful from this post!!
xoxo Kayla
