Wednesday, August 25, 2004

Gotta get the gear

My 9-year-old niece was over playing with my kids the other day when she went into my daughter's room demanding to see her school supplies. "Do you have all your school supplies? I have all my school supplies," she said, and proceeded to list every back-to-school goodie she'd gotten. When my daughter had nothing to show, her cousin was incredulous. "You don't have any school supplies? Where's your backpack? Don't you have a notebook?" It went on for so long that I had to go in and say, "Hey, we haven't gone shopping yet. Lay off."

So today we went shopping. We got the backpack, the notebook, the new sneakers (two pair -- laced for gym and laceless for the rest of the time), the subject dividers. My girl's all excited about school now that she's got her gear, so it was worth the trouble just to stop hearing "I hate school, I don't want to go back" for the next seven days. My son's got a new Scooby Doo backpack, and we'll get his notebook this weekend, and then -- well, bring it on, teachers, we're ready to rumble.

Of course, the first thing the teachers send home, their return volley so to speak, is a long list of all the school supplies they want the kids to have, some of which require the discarding or replacement of pre-purchased supplies that don't make the list. That's why I tend to drag my feet and try to get the kids wait until after Day 1 before making all our purchases. But I guess this year, a 9-year-old guilted me into getting school stuff while there was still time to get excited about school. Maybe it'll at least make my first-day after-school equipment-buying scramble a little shorter.

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