Gearing Up for a New Year

This post contains an affiliate link. If you click through and make a purchase, we receive a small commission at no additional cost to you. Hope they are helpful!


The beginning of our 12th year of homeschooling is next week. I've been working hard this week trying to get ready. In the past, we've had a homeschool room. We've had several, actually. But with the birth of our youngest daughter 6 years ago, we kind of filled up all our bedrooms to max capacity.

Our homeschool room circa 2011. Now used full-time as a bedroom. 

Another homeschool room we've had over the years. 

 And so, when we re-did our house last year, the dining room because the homeschool room. Again. That's where we started 12 years ago. But THIS time, instead of cheap plastic baskets holding all our school stuff, we got this great used china cabinet.

Isn't it great? It holds everything. Well, mostly.

Sadly, all our actual china is packed up in boxes for the time being. So we can't, you know, get it out and use parts of it twice a year anymore. Everything we currently use for homeschool fits in this cabinet. We have other homeschool books and materials that we aren't using this year stored in a closet. And at the end of the day, we can shut the doors and make our dining room look mostly like a dining room. 

So right now I'm just going through all the curriculum and making a list of school supplies we need to get and any additional materials I need to order or buy. I got our 14 year old's shelf all done. 

Also, I'm planning our first day of school. Do you have special traditions you do each year on the first day? I try to make it special. Some of our traditions are:

1. Special breakfast.

Pancakes a few years ago.

Ask me about the year I didn't have the ingredients I needed for pancakes. 

 They were happy. And I acted like it was all part of the plan! 

2. A treat at their desk. 

Usually I try to get them something they needed anyway. Somehow we moved from stickers and a special pencil the first year, to actual gifts! Who did that nonsense? So Mama had to scale that back a bit. 

This year they are getting Scrunch Maps, which they will need for school. 

3. Back-to-school pictures with the number (or letter) of their grade. 

It started out by seeing a blogger who just had her kids hold up the number of fingers for their grade. Simple. Only, my youngest at the time was starting Kindergarten. Hmm.....so I cut out what they needed and we've done it that way ever since! 

4. Whatever else my crazy head thinks up!

Honestly I have trouble keeping it simple. I love to celebrate and make the first day of school special! Little snacks and treat bag ideas off of Pinterest, First Day of School banners to take pictures by, whatever strikes my fancy. I think it makes good memories for the girls. 

This year's theme is "Looking Forward to a Fantastic Year". You'll have to see what we do with that one next week! 

Signing off,