Sorting at the Beginning

Our Academic school year began today. Tristan and Duncan moved up into Year 1 and 3 respectively. It was also the last day of Family Day Care for my daughter Frances. She re-starts Pre-School next week and also begins Pre-Kindy 2 days a week at the same school as her brothers. So it felt strange to drop all three kids off this morning and then drive home without them. It's a little taste of freedom I could not even glimpse at when this journey began nearly 8 years ago with a newborn baby's cry.

Anyway...enough reflecting. Here's what I wanted to share. The art of sorting things out BEFORE they begin. The volume of school notes, awards and newsletters can get the best of me each year. So this year I was determined to put some structures in place to help me sort through as things come home rather than at the end of the term, or heaven forbid, year.

This is my favourite IKEA piece. You may also be familiar with the Expedit. In fact some ladies on Pinterest have boards dedicated to this particularly aesthetic and versatile free-standing shelf unit. So here is the one that stands adjacent to my kitchen and gets the most use.

Top left - Each child has a magazine holder for me to store any information regarding their school year.
Top middle - Address book, Order Book (Stripey Brain 2011), Bible and Bible Study.
Top right - large square boxes for card stock and paper craft.
Bottom left - Colour coded A4 folders and suspension files for craft/notes etc. (Not sure if this will work...but willing to try something new).
Bottom right - Envelopes and writing paper (stored in Ikea DVD boxes)

Bottom middle - A clear folder for all of their school awards and stickers in 2012.
The next 3 contain information and awards prior to formal schooling. The next 2 contain Academic Reports and the last 2 contain programing and planning for ASD support and therapies. (Both my boys lie on the Autism spectrum).

On the shelf above stands 4 jars of coins. Actually 5, if you count the half full jar of foreign coins at the opposite end (not shown). Duncan and I cleaned out our money dish next to the front door and sorted the coins into the jars.


50c coins - give
$1 coins - spend
$2 coins - save


Then we bagged up the rest of the 5c, 10c and 20c and totalled $65! Just got to find time to get them to the bank and divide the proceeds into the kids' 3 accounts.

The trusty knife and chopping blocks area got a tidy.

Then I organised our DVD series into an under-used shelf unit. We have a few including, Railway Journeys,  the Thunderbirds and Indiana Jones (no Star Wars yet!). 


My stash

The West Wing - brilliant script and acting but watch with subtitles to follow along,
Wire in the Blood - BBC psychological crime thriller starring Robson Green,
McLeod's Daughters - 'sisters doing for themselves' on an Australian farm,
Life of Birds - I love birds but I could watch any 'Life' series by Sir David Attenborough,
Into the West - brilliant Historical Fiction Series about the clash of the white man's and the Native American Indian's worlds. 
Lord of the Rings - Still love the books more but these are exceptional films.
Battlelines - WW2 documentary following the personal accounts and battles of both sides.


What I would like to add to my stash:

The Wire - Possibly the BEST TV series I have ever seen by HBO. Follows the police and the  drug runners in Baltimore until the lines become so blurred you don't know who really are the criminals. 
How the West Was Lost - I bought the CDs in 1993 when I was in the US but I have never seen the documentary series. 
Downton Abbey - Missed this because it was aired on a commercial channel and I just can't do commercials.


So what's in your 'Series' stash?