All Hands: Back to School Tips, Tricks, & Recommendations
Who can believe school is already around the corner? With parents and kids gearing up for a new year, it's time to share what helps get us through the back-to-school season. This is also a great way to plug your specific offerings like new products every kid or parent needs, ways for parents to prioritize themselves, rethinking home organization, and more. Let us know your tried-and-true tips!
Ally Kirkpatrick, Old Town Books: Back-to-school season is a flurry of activity, but just because kids are back in the classroom doesn’t mean reading shouldn’t still be fun. One of the best ways to keep that excitement alive is to attend a kids’ author event because there’s nothing quite like meeting the person behind a favorite book. This fall, Old Town Books is welcoming incredible authors including Beth Lincoln, Katherine Applegate, and Stuart Gibbs!
Katherine Joseph, Alexandria Classical Christian Academy: Give the mundane back-to-school tasks a bigger purpose. Ordering uniforms, filling out medical forms, packing lunches, labeling supplies and organizing calendars can quickly become an exhausting checklist. But preparing for a new school year is about more than orderly preparation. It is about laying the groundwork for another year of cultivating knowledge and discernment, courage and joy, and a love for what is true, good and beautiful.
Try marking the beginning of school as something meaningful rather than simply hectic: have a special dinner the night before, write your child a note for the first day, or take a moment to pray together as a family. These small things can shift the perspective on even the most ordinary tasks and remind us that all of the preparation is in service of something much bigger.
Lauren Sadlon, NEAT Method: Three easy ways to make the most of your back to school season are (1) Create a lunch station - edit water bottles and lunch essentials, group everything for packing lunches together. (2) Check school clothes and uniforms now - add outgrown items to a donation bin. (3) Set up a study/homework station - edit old supplies, create a tidy set up to encourage good study habits from the start.
Adrien, Adrien Cotton Wellness Expert: I can’t help but highly recommending boundaries during one of the busiest times of the year for households with school children. This is the perfect storm that is so common - putting the kids above you.
Set boundaries. Have a plan. Maintain your wellness habits. Do not budge. Keep the walls with friends, the fitness classes, meal planning and, most of all, your quality sleep habits.
Everything that needs to get done will get done. You come first.
