Getting (re) Organized!

As I mentioned a few post ago, my goal for the Summer was to chill with my peeps and forget the day to day schedule that we are so accustomed to!

Completely accomplished what I wanted.

Completely paid for it in the past few weeks!

So, I've been on a mission to (re) organize our home and thought I'd share a few things that have been super-helpful:

1.  Charts!  They are hanging all over my house in highly visible areas.  Lots of printables can be found here! I'm using this for mornings and this for after school!  From a different site, we are using this for bedtime.  Does my house look like a preschool?  Sort of!  Tacky?  Probably!  Not my best decorating style, but it's cut down on my nagging so, so much!

2.  Lunchtime prep is a nightly activity.  I try to make all 5 lunches for the next day (this helps when the preschoolers get home - they can just pull their lunch out of the fridge - it makes getting down for a nap a little quicker)!  We bought these for the big girls' lunches (significantly cheaper at TJ Maxx!) and they are great!  From the same company, we got these for the littles' (again, at TJ Maxx)!  They have made packing healthy lunches much more manageable!

3.  We have a schedule dependent little boy!  I mean, really, really schedule dependent!  Any change can set off a series of days with significant behavior issues.  In an effort to avoid these kinds of days, we've worked hard to prep him for anything different that may happen during a given day.  Since he's in school only three days a week (and he's too young to really understand the concept of the different days of the week -- weekends really confuse him!), we made this for his room:

Each day has pictures of who will be home when he wakes up and the places he'll go that day.  Before bed each night, we move a star to the next day and talk with him about what tomorrow will look like.  It's helped so much!  For those interested in such things, the process to make this was easy:

Started with a blank bulletin board, a measuring tape and some painter's tape.

Painted.  Painted again and again (cork board is obviously porous!).

Used stencils to add the days of the week.

Pulled the tape (so gratifying!)!

Tah-Dah!

One more small project in the works . . . 

. . . involving this plank of wood!     

Will post pics of the finished project when it's . . . well, finished!

First Days

Ella Grace -- 3rd Grade -- Dr. Parris & Mrs. Field's class

Annabelle -- 1st Grade -- Mrs. Black & Mrs. Hunter's class

K-man -- K3 -- Mrs. Bagley's class

Katie -- K4 -- Mrs. Hall's Class

Li'l Peanut -- Baby Class -- MMO

With their countdown to school charts!

Goal: Met!

My goal for our Summer was to chill.
To relax our very scheduled existence.
To enjoy my children without worrying about every little detail of every little thing.

Goal:  met!

We had an incredible Summer filled with too many adventures to cover here!

A few highlights:

Our trip to Michigan to visit the Williams' side of the family.

Our trip with the Powell side to the cabin.

Our family trip to Atlanta and Stone Mountain.

I have hundreds of blog worthy pictures, but, the reality is that they'll never be posted or blogged about.  That was part of my plan!  Not to blog.  I really wanted to journal -- you know -- the old fashioned pen and paper way.  That didn't happen, but I'm not too worried about it!  See how good I was at meeting my goal?

Alas, Labor Day has passed, school has been in session for a few weeks and Summer is officially over!  I will say that I'm paying dearly now for the summer-adapted, laid back attitude.  My kiddos (and myself) are having a hard time getting back into the routine!  No regrets -- just, maybe, we should've started back into the routine a little sooner than, well, the first day of school.

Oh well!  I have several things in the works to get us (re)organized and back on schedule!  I'm planning to share many here in case you are facing some of the same difficulties we are!  Also will update soon on our family dynamic and the process of adoption!!

Until then . . .