Back to School Feasting

The big night is finally here!!!  The kids were all so excited they could hardly fall asleep.  The excitement and adrenaline of tomorrow will help to get them up and moving in the morning, I'm sure, but I have to admit -- I'm a little nervous for days 2, 3, and so on.  Waking up early is NO ONE's cup of tea in this household, and Ethan has it the worst of all! Starting tomorrow he'll be waking up at 5:45 AM.  :(

Meanwhile, today was one BUSY day.  Having a purpose helps ALL of us to function better, so to get the kids through the day without them spiraling out of control because they were so anxious for tomorrow to get here, I decided it would be really fun to amp up our Back to School Feast festivities this time around.  After Scripture Time this morning, I unveiled my plans to turn our dinner tonight into an al fresco experience.  The kids were totally on board, and the rest of the day was spent in various states of preparation for tomorrow.

{Pretending to be a bunny, of course.  Hahaha.}

A family of bunnies.  :)

First up was a mega Costco trip to stock the fridge and pantry with lunch making options, and once I was home, Grace eagerly jumped on the task of cleaning out and organizing the pantry to make room for all the extras.  Meanwhile, Sophie and Jane hopped to work making the decorations for our Feast, and with Lover Boy lost in his superhero action figure world, I ran Ethan over to Supercuts to finally get his hair cut.

Before

After

I came home to some cute "Back to School" buntings from the girlie bugs and an absolute carnage of cardboard boxes strewn across the kitchen floor.  But at least the pantry was organized, right?  Hahaha.  While I started to clean up and make dinner, Ethan got to work hauling out the Christmas lights to wrap around the back porch railing.  Our final step was to move the kitchen table outside and wait for Scott to get home.  Luckily, he was able to leave work a little early, so we were able to start our Back to School Feast Extravaganza right at 5!  In addition to feasting on our now "traditional" meal of hamburgers, corn on the cob, and watermelon, we also combined it with Family Home Evening {it never happened Monday night because of Junior High Open House with Ethan taking FOREVER} and an introduction to this school year's new theme.

Jane wanted hers to be a school bus bunting.  How cute is that???  She drew and cut out all of the buses, while copying the spelling of "Back to School" from the menu calendar off the fridge.  Such a creative little genius.  :)

 Grace's decoration

 Sophie's bunting

 Jane's

And superheroes need to feast, too, you know.  Hahaha.

 {Sneak peak at our new theme}

 Ready to eat!!

{Our flowers actually grew from the "seeds of faith" FHE lesson we had in the spring!}

After that it was showers/baths and father's blessings for everyone to start the new year, and then family prayers and hugs and off to bed!  With only a brief detour for Jane to give us a "fashion show" of her new outfit for tomorrow and for her to read a cute poem from her new teacher with some "Jitter Glitter" to sprinkle in the front lawn.  :)  It was kind of adorable.

Cute little love pup jumped right up on the chair for his blessing.  It was adorable.  Especially since he was actually SUPER reverent and quiet throughout his whole blessing.  Of course, the reverence didn't last for the OTHER blessings, but I'll take what I can get with that kid!

"Jitter Glitter" poem.  It was so cute -- basically the idea was to sprinkle some glitter on the lawn the night before the first day of school to help you not be nervous.  :)

Of course, it had just started to literally POUR rain when she went out to sprinkle the glitter, but she managed to get it done and even saved some to sprinkle for tomorrow.  :)

It took awhile for everyone to get settled into bed, but I think tomorrow is going to be a great day!  Although, I have a feeling that Alex is going to be REALLY bored when he realizes there won't be anyone at home to play with all day long...  :)