Back to Preschool Check List

Two weeks and counting until preschool starts back up again and I’m not quite sure how I feel about it. Emily is headed into TK so she will be going 5 days a week and Sophie is in the 3’s class so she will be going 3 days a week. I struggle with this every year, knowing that I have them home for a little less time each day. Part of me is so glad that I will have a bit of a break and the other part is so sad that I won’t see them as much. Talk about internal conflict. Regardless of how I feel, time marches on so that means school is starting soon and we need to be ready.

Our school does not give us an actual “preschool supply list” but over the years I’ve found there are several must haves that need to be taken care of before the year starts.

Things they use:

School bag– Our school provides each student with a standard school bag to reuse each year so this is automatically taken care of for us, but if your school does not do this then try to pick a bag your child can easily put on/off and carry themselves that will fit a lunch box, water bottle, art or papers coming home, and potentially a spare change of clothes.
Lunch Box: We try to reuse the same lunch boxes for several years in a row, but they can get yucky after a while. We typically use the Pottery Barn standard kids lunch box and have each child’s name monogrammed on the front to help with identification. We also pick different colors for different kids to make it easy to find a particular lunch box on days not everyone goes to school.
Bentgo Box: Lunches have to be contained in something and we have really liked using these Bentgo Boxes. They have different spots for all kinds of food and do a great job of keeping food cool and fresh. We usually make lunches the day before school so the compact design helps keep fridge clutter to a minimum. They can be a tight squeeze in our lunch boxes with an ice pack (debatable if you need to send one with or not), but they have worked great. Our kids are also able to easily open and close them which makes lunch time easier for their teachers. Each kid has their own design but as we have more kids in school I can see this becoming problematic.
Water Bottles: We have worked our way through many different kinds of water bottles for school and after several embarrassing carpool moments where the teacher picks up a soaking wet bag, I’ve come to one conclusion. You can’t go cheap on a school water bottle. In some situations it works ok but for this one it is just better to pay for a really nice water bottle and wash it out after school than to have a lot of less expensive options. Each of our kids has a main water bottle and an auxiliary option. We opted for the Yeti kids rambler Jr. and have never once been disappointed. Our older kids both have pink but we have labels that identify which one goes in which bag.

Things they wear:

Standard Wardrobe– Before school starts each year I do a once over on our kids wardrobes to be sure we have enough to get us into the next growth spurt or season. I typically only leave out clothes that are appropriate for the weather to help make choices easier and minimize before school outfit battles. More often than not, they go in something mis-matched but they find so much pride in being able to pick out their own clothes. Inevitably if I leave winter clothes out they will try to wear them on 90 degree days, so having less helps keep those issues at bay. I try to have enough of each certain type of outfit for a few days at a time but not much more. A few pairs of shorts or pants, shirts they can match easily, and lots of dresses. We also try to have “school specific clothes” that are ok to get messy versus nicer outfits for church or non-school related events.
Back to School outfits- Every season I buy them one nice matching outfit that serves many different purposes. Back to school outfits are also school picture outfits and will satisfy any “nicer” outfit needs until they have their nice holiday outfits. It’s nice to know that they all have one standard matching dress for family events or pictures that we may not have been planning for.
Extra pair of old clothes and shoes: As I’m cleaning out their drawers in anticipation of school starting I always put aside one full extra outfit and pair of shoes (usually an older hand me down pair) that is seasonally appropriate and a little big to have as a spare set through the next few months. Our school does a great job of actually storing these in the classroom so it doesn’t have to sit in their bags for months at a time, but regardless of where it is stored having that spare set of clothes will always come in handy.
School Shoes: At the beginning of each school year, each kid gets one new pair of “school shoes“. If their pair from last year still fits, I will buy a size up in anticipation of that random weekday they wake up and no longer have a pair that fits. I used to try to take everyone out to shop but it is way easier to just order them and the kids always have fun scrolling online to look. Our school does have a dress code for what kind of shoes our kids can wear so this is helpful to establish in advance that sadly princess dress up shoes are not for school, only school shoes are for school.
Labels- Clothes, Water Bottle, Lunch: I label everything. Their clothes, jackets, sweaters, spare clothes, spare shoes, all of it. Anything that goes with them has a label. I use Inchbug for all clothes and water bottle labels and I use these labels for Bentgo boxes because they dissolve!

Things for home:

Miss Mouth’s Messy Eater Spray: There will inevitably be some really messy shirts that come home from school and I can’t sing the praises of this stain remover enough. It’s like magic. The stains disappear right in front of me and I actually get excited when there’s something I need to spray.
Silicone Mat: School brings out so much curiosity with my kids and they love to show me their new art or writing skills at home. I’ve been using these silicone mats on our kitchen table for a long time and am very grateful for all the messes have absorbed. They are bigger than standard placemats so those little marks that happen from coloring over the edge are caught instead of ending up on the side of the placement. We leave them on our table all the time and each kid has a different color so they automatically go to “their spot” at the table. No one fights over a certain chair and they make meal clean up easy too.
Mesh Zipper Pouches: This was a game changer for me and suggested by a friend of mine that is a professional organizer. At the start of each school year, I label one of these pouches for all the art or things my kids will bring home from school that I want to save. If it doesn’t fit then maybe I shouldn’t keep it, and it makes it easy to categorize yearly sentimental items to save. Then at the end of the summer I put the pouch in their memory box and start a new one for the next school year.

They have the shoes, the clothes, and the labels but that still doesn’t make me ready. I always feel weird getting my kids ready to go back to school, but knowing they have all the right gear makes it a little easier to let them go.

Does this feeling ever get easier? What did I forget? Anything you would add to the list?

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