Ready or not...

School starts for my two oldest tomorrow!

I am not sure how I feel. Part of me is sad, because we had such a fun summer doing so many neat things and I love having them home with me. Plus, I will be honest, I am totally not looking forward to the drudgery of homework, making lunches, getting kids up early, hairstyles, bathing my children nightly every other night hopefully at least twice a week.

On the other hand, I loved going back to school as a child and I still love it as a parent. I love the fresh start and a chance to get into a routine once more. I especially love the kick in the pants it gives me to keep our house organized and tidy after a summer of letting everything go!

Here are some of the things that I do to help keep our school days running smoothly!

Lunch basket

Making lunches is definitely one of those things that I am awesome at during the first half of the year and not so awesome at later on. But this lunch basket helps me power through the end of the school year. In it, I keep cookie cutters of different shapes and sizes, food markers, straws, small jars with lids, our favorite lunchboxes, and a sweet letter Tempe wrote to me about how she loves the "fun lunches" I make to give me some inspiration.

Garage mudroom

  

Our house doesn't have a mudroom, so I set up a little mudroom area in our garage. The kids keep their coats, backpacks, boots, and mittens/gloves/hats out here so it doesn't clutter up my house. Plus, in the winter they can leave their wet and muddy boots out here!

Mom command station

We also don't have an office in our house, but my desk fits just perfectly in this little nook next to the couch. I keep all of our school supplies in one of the drawers, my bills in the organizer, and the computer and printer here (the printer fits on the windowseat right behind the desk so it's out of the way!)

Wall of Fame

I hung a clipboard for each of my kids on the wall in the kitchen where I can put all their schoolwork and things that need to be sent back. I review it every night while they're doing homework so I can keep up with the flood of papers that come home from school with them.

What do you do to keep organized?