Ways to Stay Alive During the Last Month of School

Here we are, less than one month left, the new December in May where you try to cram the entire school year into less than thirty days.  How do you survive?  Here's a few tips:

Lunches -
Go ahead and buy the pre-made stuff, your morning will thank you. You survived a school year of making healthful lunches you know their either gave to their friends or threw in the trash. I put half a rotisserie chicken in my teenager's lunch because it fit in the gallon Ziplock bag. Slim Jims, cheese, sandwiches, go healthy with precut carrots and don't forget dessert - they will get some calories out of the Little Debbie Oatmeal brownie even if they throw the rotisserie chicken away.

Getting up in the morning -
From the beginning of the school year waking them up an hour early so they can ease into their day to throwing a pot of cold water on them 15 minutes before leaving.

Clothes -
They go from laying out clothes the night before to the "sniff" test that morning. You're stepping over mountains of laundry just hoping for clean underwear. Absolutely refuse to do the "sniff" test on any teenager clothing, you will thank me!

Carpool -
Your kids won't care how late you are to carpool, this is their last days of standing outside in the sunshine talking to all the girls, I mean all their friends. So take the extra time at the grocery store finding all those pre-made items before picking them up.

Teacher Appreciation -
Early in the year it was the Pinterest inspired handsome craft for the teacher, oh who am I kidding? I left that at Kindergarten.  Don't forget to appreciate all those teachers who's names you can't remember by giving your children a bag of gift cards to hand out. Honestly, they want a gift card to a restaurant with a fancy bar more than the handmade pot with paper flowers. Better yet, your child will forget to give all the gifts to their teachers and you have a ready made party in a bag for summer!

Last Day of School -
Let them go in, smell and all, with a moldy ham sandwich and half a grape congratulating yourself on a job well done. Or better yet, check everyone's absences and see if they still have a few left, turning off the alarms if they do!

You survived 180 days of education, now onto letting their minds ferment for the three months of summer before realizing you have to cram an entire summer vacation into the last week!