Back-To-School Shopping

So $130 today to buy the school supplies for Girl and Jones. Is that a lot? That’s just supplies – the stuff on the list plus some stuff from the wish list. I no doubt could have saved a bundle if I’d gone to Wal-mart, but I won’t, because it makes me sad. Plus, I’m only brand-loyal about a very few things, but many of them are school supplies.

I am lucky that they still love their old backpacks, which I decorated last year with the insignia from their made-up super heroes – Zappy Guy and Gadget Girl. And I only bought a very few clothes, as they have to wear uniforms, which is magnificent. Their grandma is taking them for new shoes. So, they’re set.

We are presently in the midst of a domestic purge catalyzed by Jones destroying each and every one of the models he not two days ago brought back from Legoland and his father painstakingly assembled. So, really, I should by all rights have made more of an effort to scrounge up the old supplies, many of which were untouched from last year. But that would have involved a full-on archeological dig. Plus I have such fond memories of my own back-to-school shopping, which was a full day of sibling-free one-on-one with Mom, including Department! Store! Lunch! So, essentially the children get High School Musical pencils because I used to get clam strips.

The list at Girl’s old school in Maryland was very do-what-feels-good. This one is far more dictatorial. Portfolios can be whatever color you choose but NO DESIGNS PLEASE. Binders will be 3” (I had to convince myself they didn’t mean 3-ring binder I had never seen a 3” binder before. It’s like a little briefcase.) I cheated a little, as I assume all moms do, because I don’t want my child to be the only chump with a pink eraser when she could have the one shaped like a panda she got from Balboa Park. I’m less concerned with Jones, who is a big doodler anyway.

Milestone: Being a fifth grader, Girl graduates to protractor, compass, and calculator this year. Her calculator is shaped like an adorable pink cell phone, which is either the most inspired or most pernicious thing I’ve ever seen. Our generation of Barbie famously complained that “Math is hard.” Perhaps if she’d had a cute pink calculator?....