It’s in the air: the promise of fall. New backpacks and rhythms and football Saturdays. It’s close. Many students are heading back to classrooms in the coming weeks and as quickly as summer was here, it will slip away until next year.
While we still technically have a month of summer, it is beginning to feel like the close of a season. For many, fall is the second new year. Fall means a fresh start: pointy new crayons, clean tennis shoes, and sleepy eyes in the morning. It’s a time to return to good, comforting rhythms and maybe even make some new ones. Before it’s officially here, let’s take some time and Prep for Fall.
Name what matters.
Before we get to the practical and specifics on how to Prep for Fall, let’s think through how we want this upcoming season to feel.
Here are some questions to ask ourselves:
How do we want mornings before school to feel?
How do we want after school to feel?
In what ways do we want to encourage and react when we drop off and pick up?
Homeschooling families: how do we want our days to feel and flow?
The Lazy Genius, Kendra Adachi, suggests: Name what matters.
Let’s take time to name what matters before we get practical and Prep for Fall. For our family, I want the mornings to feel unhurried. I want our days to flow in a way that makes sense: each person having appropriate expectations for our school time. I want the rest of our day to be fun, family time where we explore and do life together. Those are my pie-in-the-sky dreams for this fall. But really and truly naming what matters can help get us to where we want to be.
As always, the following practical tips aren’t going to work for every family. Pick and choose what works and leave the rest.
Prep for Fall
Assess and shop for supplies.
What is needed to begin life in the fall? If kids are going to school, of course there will be school supplies. And if kids are at home, think through supplies needed to learn and create. It’s also smart to process how supplies will be organized and accessed. If you’re a homeschooling family, check out Gather Supplies.
There could be other needs as well. Hooks for backpacks, bins to contain homework and permission slips. A spot to hang and rotate art work. A calendar or planner to keep track of allll the things. Lunchboxes and water bottles and after school snacks. Make a list of needed supplies and then shop.
Write out a rhythm.
Let’s remember and reflect how we want our days to feel and then write out a rhythm. We do not have to live and die by this rhythm. It’s simply a tool to be intentional with our days. Taking the time to think through and write down a daily rhythm is powerful so we can do what we want to do with our days.
When I was a young mom, a more experienced mom was telling me how her mornings had been a struggle for so long. She sat down one day and brainstormed. She figured out if she woke the kids ten minutes earlier it might solve her problem and she was right. It made all the difference and her mornings were more joyful because of that one, small tweak.
When we write out a rhythm or routine, it allows our brain to be aware of how we want our days to look and feel. Once we follow that rhythm day after day, it slowly becomes habit. Let’s intentionally make our days look and feel the way we want them to.
Purge the car.
Let’s start the fall fresh with a clean car. Get a trash bag and ruthlessly declutter the car. Take everything out, maybe even vacuum, and then only put back what you know your family will use this fall. Purging the car is a small thing yielding a big reward.
Create a lunch station.
We all have to eat lunch. Whether kids are at home or going to school, create a lunch station or rhythm that makes lunch simpler. Have bins in the pantry and fridge with items specifically for lunches. Cheese sticks, yogurts, applesauce, individual fruit and veggie baggies, lunch meat, crackers, fruit strips. Whether you or your kids are making lunches, try and make it as streamlined as possible so lunch isn’t a point of frustration.
For our family, I have two ways to keep lunch simple. First, I choose something from each food group to put on plates for lunch. Protein, fruit, veggie, dairy, and a grain. Second, we eat the same thing most days. Peanut butter and jelly sandwich or toast, berries or grapes, sliced peppers or cucumbers, salami, and a cheese stick or yogurt. It might change if we have leftovers to eat up or if I have some chicken nuggets in the freezer, but most of the time we eat the same thing everyday. And incredibly enough, the kids don’t complain much.
Creating a lunch station takes one decision off our plate and conserves brain power.
Stock up.
We all know getting back into the swing of things can be slow process. Let’s help our future fall selves and stock up for a season when sometimes all we want to do is fall into bed at 6:00. Stock up on paper goods, pantry items, and lunch things. Think: paper towels, toilet paper, toiletries, tortilla chips, applesauce, condiments, after school snacks. Stock up on whatever your family needs to function well at the beginning of fall. Take some pressure off by stocking up on items now so you can focus on what matters this fall.
Build in margin.
Fall is an adjustment for everyone, kids included. It is exciting and exhausting. Calendars in hand, let’s take a step back and make sure there is margin built in. After a full week of school and soccer, build in some slow times together over the weekend. If Wednesdays are exceptionally full, make Thursday an evening at home. Look at the weeks and see where margin is needed.
Although it might not be clear to me at the time, I can usually tell after the fact when I have pushed my kids too hard. I have slowly learned how I need to build in margin so we all get the rest and down time we need.
Fall is a time of new beginnings. Let’s do a few things now so we are prepared for the good things ahead. What will you do to Prep for Fall?
