Good-Bye Summer 2012...Happy New School Year 2012-2013

So the kids have been back to school for a week and I am trying to get caught up with all those things around the house that are hard to get done with four kids at home. Closets are all organized and clean, old clothes have been donated, my Project Life album is up-to-date, my calendar is all filled-in with their activities for the month, I organized all their school work from last year and purged all the papers we don't need, and I reorganized all our financial papers so it's easier to pay the bills each month. Ahhh, yes, wouldn't that be just wonderful if it were all true. 

I started to clean out their closets but never finished. I am trying desperately to get my Project Life book finished from January to June but still have to order pictures from Shutterfly. I still have two huge folders of Ryan's and Molly's work from fourth and second grade that needs to be organized. And all those bills and financial papers, well, the system I have now will just have to do. 

But, I do love this time of year and the start of the school. To me, the new school year is more of a fresh start than New Year's Day in January. When the new school year starts, everyone gets a fresh start. It's a clean slate. It doesn't matter what happened in your class the year before. It doesn't matter if you forgot to do your homework or if you forgot to bring your homework to school or if you didn't understand a unit in science or if you were told one too many times to stop talking during sustained silent reading. This week my kids all got a "do-over." They are in new classrooms with new teachers with new groups of friends and they all get a fresh new start. Just like their notebooks that are filled with fresh, crisp, white clean pages, they also get a fresh start and get to decide what kind a year they are going to have.

So even though I have a lot on my own to-do list for this new year I did manage to make a Shutterfly book of our summer adventures this Labor Day weekend. One thing I can check off the list.

Good-bye Summer 2012 and Happy New School Year Everyone!

Click here to view this photo book larger

Happy New School Year 2012-2013