1. The First Day Back to School should be a National Holiday where all parents get the day off of to have bottomless mimosas and take an actual bath or bathroom break without someone bringing you the iPad to look up videos or flings a fidget spinner in your direction.

2. Uniforms are both a blessing and a curse. No arguments over what to wear in the morning, but today my son informed me his uniform shorts make his butt itch. Its always something (smacks forehead.)

3. You know you're ready for school days to be longer when you're willing to keep writing checks for every after school activity under the sun just to give you the extra 35 minutes of free time. (Signs up kid for under water basket weaving club.)

4. The first week back to school all parents feel a bit bipolar. At one point you're shoving them out the door and into the car and the first in the drop off line, driving away cranking up the 2 Live Crew and heading straight to your pedicure appointment. And at any given point in the 6 hours they are gone you catch a glimpse of their tiny underwear or a sock and break down into a full blown sobbing, snotting mess of a depression because they are growing up too fast and you want them to stay your baby forever. There's very little in between. The only cure for this is a cruise around Target, solo style.

5. Another school year means another set of new parents to meet and more of my awkward social anxiety and it doesn't help that my wardrobe is less LuLuLemon/Lily Pulitzer and more Morticia Addams and shirts with curse words. Thank goodness we don't have to exit our vehicles for drop off and pick up...no one needs to see me braless and in my pajamas.

6. I have found that I am willing to wake up everyone in the house at 5 am if it guarantees me that they're in bed at 7:00 or 7:30 pm. Really just so I can enjoy the extra down time between packing lunch and doing laundry and watch Game Of Thrones. Hashtag Winter Is Here, Bitches. Go To Sleep!!

7. I'm sure that my personal offense to the fact that my son ate 3 bites of the carefully crafted and specially curated culinary 'experience' that is packed ever so delicately into his lunch box will wear off after this first week. Week two he will be looking at crackers, yogurt and maybe a pop tart...

8. Pay the big bucks for tuition, uniforms, clothes, shoes, new backpacks, lunch boxes, etc, and all you hear when you ask how their day was is "Good, I guess. Can we go get a happy meal?" FML.

9. Confession: I'm not sure about other parents, but I have to set alarms on my phone so I don't forget to pick up my own kid, because I am either frantically cleaning the house so that it looks decent for 30 min or I'm actually enjoying my alone time that much. Either one is can be super distracting.

10. When you look around at all of the tan and toned and summery blonde Moms and think...."I didn't do summer right." Not tanned, not toned and not summery blonde. More like pasty legs and sunburnt torso from all the pool time, 10 extra pounds of BBQ weight, hands dyed blue from making slime and and hair a slight tinge of green from chlorine.

In all seriousness, I'd like us all to remember that there are parents out there looking at all of these kids going back to school on social media who can't post a picture because they are home or at hospitals caring for their sick children who desperately just want to join in on the simple pleasures of schools and lunches and clubs and bus stops. Please send whatever you believe in, whether it be love and light, collective consciousness or prayers...do it for those parents who suffer silently caring for their kids.

Powered by Squarespace