Smash Book

Well we're on the final countdown to Operation FREEDOM for Meee!! This morning, tomorrow and Wednesday mornings are Finals, then Grad practice Thursday and Friday mornings, then Graduation Friday night, and I am done with dealing with School For-Evah!!
(There's still college, but that's a whole different ballgame than K-12.)




I was reading in the paper last week about the Special School Board meetings they've been having to try to figure out how to keep schools running next year. They say they've already cut the Budget as far as they could, now they're having to cut into the quick. Even less money for text books (they already don't have enough books for every kid, so they can't assign homework that involves bringing a book home), they aren't filling any of the current openings and have let 7, I think it was, teachers go, and cutting the Art & Music programs.

All I could think was Thank God we're getting out of there when we are!


Woot! I'm just so excited, I can't even tell you.
I got my oldest son, who is 25 now, started in 'school' when he was 2.5, going to Mother's Morning Out a couple of mornings a week. It never stopped from there, never.  He went to 3 & 4 yo. pre-k, then Kindygarden, then 1st grade and so on. Then his younger brother right behind him, and their younger brother behind them.
Altogether, over 40 years of school time served.

I'm done! - Let the Celebrations begin!!

We have a lot of celebrating to do this year. Kevin turns 18 on Wednesday, before he graduates on Friday, so his Friday night party will be a birthday/grad deal mix.
My sister that lives in Florida is coming up for Kev's graduation, and will likely be the last time she's able to make it back up before Thanksgiving, so we planned a big family cookout/Diapers & Wipes baby shower for her at Mom's on Saturday.
Her middle son is also graduating high school this year, and our cousin graduated from Law School this past Saturday, so the family cookout/shower is also celebrating all our Grads.
In addition to Kev's birthday Wednesday, my youngest nephew and my sister also had birthdays this month, so I'll just take along the birthday decorations from Kev's party Friday night and stick them up and celebrate birthdays with family, too!

With all that going on, I had to make lists. I had already bought some of the party supplies, but needed more, and what cakes I need to order, and I've been getting Grad announcements from people J works with I need to send cards to, and people sending Kev Grad cards/gifts I have to record and sending Thank you cards back.

My "Slash" book finally started getting a workout.
(I keep getting "Slam" and "Smash" book mixed up so I end up calling mine a "Slash" book half the time, lol.)

First, I needed a Calendar so I could actually see the days I was working with. The i'net has several million choices for calendar printing. I liked this one from Anything But Perfect.

I went on the page underneath and wrote out all the important dates/info I needed to remember for this month.

First up event (in date) is Kev's birthday. I found some cute printables from Leelou-blogs, just printed and cut out what I wanted, which was the little flag banner, and the note card looking sheet.
The napkin is the design of the party supplies I bought, but they only had napkins and a banner in stock, so I need to go to another Dollar Tree to look for plates and a tablecloth.
The note card page is blank, but it's a reminder to me to buy him a new mp3 player for a birthday present. (I don't know how it reminds me, it just does.)

I found this Graduate Silhouettes printable at Just Something I Made and clipped them out and made a list of the Grads, names and addresses I need to send cards to.
(On the left side I cut out info about Honors night on Thursday and info/instructions for Graduation practice/ceremony.) I left a space for...I don't know what.

These pages are for planning the Grad party. I forgot to leave space for recording gifts/thank you notes, so I need to re-arrange something, or just fit them in the spaces there are.

Then, my sister's Diaper & Wipes shower. I did the invitations, inviting, and am supplying the party supplies and cake.  Mom and the Aunts and Cousins are handling the food for the Cookout so I don't have to worry about that.

It ain't fancy, and hopefully I get better at it with practice/over time. But it keeps my thoughts straight.
The thing about me and lists, when I write a plain list on a plain piece of paper, for some reason I have a hard time processing what's written. I'll overlook something four or five times before finally seeing it.
The calendar and all the little graphics and things here help me to see what I'm looking at/dealing with.