Blake doing his rendition of "School's Out for Summer"
Stopping short of channeling Rodney Dangerfield, I’m ready for back to school. Last week, Abby said she was quitting summer, and I thought, “No, I’m not quite over it yet.”
Folks, I’m over it. I’m ready for the sweet change of the season, and this surprises me. I hang on to every moment, every milestone. But perhaps I’ve been preparing for Dillon’s entry into kindergarten ever since he turned 5 and later graduated from 4K.
It’s been a wild ride, but I’m ready to conclude the Frat Party of 2011. Let the closing ceremonies begin.
I realized my excitement as I pushed the shopping cart through Walmart the other night. To be clear, I don’t love Wal-Mart. Drama happens in Walmart. But Walmart = school supplies, so off I went. I went straight to the school supply aisle and got to work. Crayola Classic Markers. Check. Number two pencils. Check. But when I got to the crayons, there were only two boxes left. I needed four. And the blunt-ended scissors? Gone, too.
“Oh, well,” I said to myself, thinking that’s what I get for waiting until after the “sales tax holiday” to shop for supplies. I should have known everything would be gone. “Excuse me, ma’am?” I asked a sales associate. “When will you restock?”
“You know there are big boxes full of supplies on the other aisle.”
No, I didn’t know. I’m a school-supply-shopping novice. She led me around the corner to the Oz of school supplies. Boxes and boxes of crayons and scissors and glue sticks, oh my! It was too easy. I was sad when I checked everything off the list.
Then I headed to the fabric section to get a 1/2 yard of muslin. I don’t buy fabric. I’m not crafty. I had heard of muslin but had no idea where to look. A friendly sales associate said, “Oh, I’ll get it for you. How much do you need?” They were so prepared! At that moment, I was officially loving Walmart.
Later, I expressed my joy on Facebook. Shopping for schools supplies was actually fun! Most of my friends agreed with Hilda, who wrote, “There’s just something exciting about brand new markers, crayons, paper, and glue!”
But my friend, Patience, wrote, “Um, you’re insane. That’s what I think.”
I guess it’s a matter of opinion.
If you’d like to subscribe to my blog, click here.
I adore school supplies and really miss that big trip to the store to stock up. My son was never into the whole thing, not even the supplies part! Broke my heart ;( So the end of summer was always very sad around our house!
Blake is absolutely adorable in that picture!
He is our comic relief for sure! And I failed to mention that I went shopping alone. If I had taken the kids, it would have been a different experience.
That’s such a GREAT picture of the little man, he’s def in character there
AS FOR THE COMMENT, that was posted after spending 5 hours in 100+ degree temperature w/ both of my little loves…so my comment is partially skewed…just to set the record straight. I do LOVE getting my girls ready for back to school but it is truely maddening going through the process of finding everything needed. You lucked up and found all you needed at Walmart, after 4 stores I was able to check off my list….. SO to my credit, I “semi” take my comment back 
Lesson learned, don’t procrastinate!
PS LOVE your blog!
I guess I should also confess I still haven’t shopped for clothes! And 4 stores? That would have sent me over the edge.
Ha ha, I knew you’d come around. We live on a street w/ lots of kids, too, so I know all about that. Yours is obviously the party house.
I hit Target and the dollar store for school supplies & it was fun!
Yesterday, I hit my mom limit. Today, I’ve managed to find my center again. Ohhmmmm.
I have always loved school supplies. I don’t think I would like shopping for them now, though. It used to be pretty basic (pencils, paper, notebooks, crayons, glue, scissors, etc.). The new lists that I see at Wal-mart now are just crazy.
One of my favorite movie lines…
Joe Fox: Don’t you love New York in the fall? It makes me wanna buy school supplies. I would send you a bouquet of newly sharpened pencils if I knew your name and address. On the other hand, this not knowing has its charms.
I would love a bouquet of newly sharpened pencils! And that’s exactly what I enjoyed about this school shopping experience. It was very basic. But it would have been fun to be able to buy a Trapper Keeper!
Wal-Mart and school supplies…OH MY!! A disaster waiting to happen! I am soooooooo glad I don’t have to do that any more with my daughter waaaay out of school. I hear people at the office talking about all the lists and all the supplies they have to send to the schools and it just flat blows my mind. When I was in school and when my daughter was in school, we bought a few things, but, we didn’t have to completely supply all the school’s needs.
Now, the clothes shopping for school never bothered me at all, I enjoyed taking my daughter since she never had a clue what she wanted and I would just pick out everything for her. Believe it or not, this was the modus operandi even when she was a teen, she just didn’t care about clothes and couldn’t pick anything. I would watch this for about an hour and then just pick it all out, have her try it on and Volia! Shopping done.
I have no idea if she is still that bad about clothes these days, I’ll have to get an update from her husband.
Love the pic of Blake, he is such a character.
Blake definitely keeps us entertained. And Shawn is MY fashion consultant.
I’ve heard the lists can get ridiculous… when I worked at Channel 5 I did a story about it… I added up the cost (for middle school supplies, I think) and it was pretty crazy. My list this year was very manageable.
School supply shopping is close to ecstasy! And if it is mixed with a stop at an office supply store, all the better. I have to remind myself that I don’t want to live through my children, but I can’t help it when they want to buy a notebook and markers and pencils. I encourage them to get more! I don’t think this love of school supply shopping will diminish over the years for me
When I worked at the TV station, I loved to raid the supply closet! A fresh notepad and a pack of pens = heaven.
I am an office supply junkie. I will FIND reasons to go to Staples or Office Depot, because, “YES, HUSBAND, I absolutely DO need 50 fine tip multi-colored sharpies!” Sheesh, always with the 3rd degree. You’d think I didn’t have a 2 and 4 year old anxiously slinking around my ankles WAITING for me to accidentally leave one on the desk so they could make forbidden tattoos on each others foreheads. And you can forget about going to the grocery stores when they have .25 cent boxes of Crayolas. They = MINE.
Thank you for visiting my blog! I’m so glad I’m not alone in this.
I hear bells, buzzers, ringing, voices — it’s been a LONG summer. Bring on FALL!!!
Oh, gosh. School supplies! It’s been such a long time. Sigh.