I love new pencils

One by one, homeschools are gearing up and beginning a new school year. A friend recently Facebooked a picture of her elementary aged kids on their first day of school. The picture shows brother and sister sitting at the dining room table with eager smiles on their faces. On the table are folders and notebooks and of course ... new pencils.

I always made a special day out of our first day of school ... some years it was a special breakfast ... other years the day included a picnic at a local park. But every year included new school "treats" that I had purchased in the weeks prior to beginning. My kids always anticipated that first day ... excited to see what fun folders I had purchased or if I had found special shaped erasers or pencils with their names on them.

These days I have one in college and two in high school. Nobody gets excited about folders and pencils any longer. But I have decided it's still important to "celebrate" in some fashion ... despite the moans and groans that I will hear when I present them with their planning notebooks and pile of books and computer software. This year we'll take a day and drive a couple hours to a favorite amusement park. We'll eat junk food, get sunburned, and end the day at the local burger joint. While we won't have new pencils to admire, we'll have some new memories and peeling skin to kick off another year of learning and growing.

What do you do to kick off the new school year?

~Judy