School Shopping

Wow, I didn't think this would be such a big project, but holy cow! We were at Wal-Mart for 3 hours, and still had 2 more stores to go!

Emeline is starting Kindergarten, Tom is in 2nd Grade, and Jacob is in 5th Grade. 3 in school. And the supply list just gets longer and longer each year.

We started out with underclothes. I"m not a big school clothes shopper, and think that the kids should just get pants and shirts when they grow out of a size. Well, I take that back. They should have 1 new outfit to start school in. After that, as long as they have clothes to wear, they're set.

But underclothes, I buy at the start of school. Since Eme didn't start school last year, she missed out on the underclothes. She's not a big complainer, so she didn't tell my just how bad her underware and undershirts were. Let me tell you, pretty bad. She was wearing a size 6 in underware, and a size 4 in undershirts (Joe wears a 4-6).

Jacob got mens ankle socks, XL boys undershirts, and mens small boxers. He's such a big kid. Tom got boys large crew socks, L boys undershirts, and Large boys boxers. He too is growing like a weed! Emeline got Medium undershirts (size 10), medium girl socks, and size 10 underware. Poor thing was squeezing into such tiny undies before! I even bought Joe new underclothes, lest the same thing that happened to Emeline last year happens to him this year :) And poor Jim missed out on anything at all. Oh well. He didn't know what was going on anyway.

Then, it was off to shoes. They kids really wanted new school shoes. And Wal-mart had a section with $7.50 sneakers. Sounded good to me, as long as the kids didn't mind the cheapest shoes. Jacob got a size 7 in mens, Tom a size 4.5 in boys, and Eme a size 2 in children. Joe and Jim didn't get any, since they're not starting school.

Then, it was finally on to school supplies. I wasn't sure how I was gonna keep them all separated, so I decided to buy them each a smaller sized action packer. A silver one each. Then, as we went down the list of school supplies, they each could throw them into their own silver box. Genius!

We bought pencils, and glue, and pink erasers, and spiral bound notebooks, crayons, markers, rulers, pencil boxes, paper, scissors, tons and tons of stuff. The only thing that I didn't buy was Crayola dry erase markers (yeah, where were those) and a Spanish/English dictionary. ARE YOU KIDDING ME! We speak english, so I see no reason to get a translation dictionary. Just because 75% of our school doesn't speak English as their first language doesn't mean my kids do! Thank you very much :)

When we got to the check out, we asked the cashier to dump the silver boxes, and ring up those items, then put them back in the box. Then, we could just put on the lid, and have all their school supplies separated and safe. Again, genius!

Then it was off to Hobby Lobby to return some craft items, and to Big Lots, where we got folders. Jacob got snowboarding, and Eme got kitties and puppies. Better than plain colors, anyway. After that, it was off for home!

What a long day. We left a little before 10 am, and got home at 3pm. Thats a big and busy day of school shopping. At least they only start school once a year.......Oh wait, we're moving (probably) after the first few weeks to first few months) of school. Am I gonna have to do this all over again?????