Since somehow having managed nearly switching to my husband's sleep schedule, I got up after him, about 4:45am. I still haven't gotten used to these early hours though so nothing productive happened until I made oatmeal at 7:30. I woke the kiddo at 8am, school started at 9am.


Having already done the dishes (emptying dishwasher, reloading and doing any necessary hand-washing) Kiddo is outside right now playing with the neighbor kids. I don't know if DH will be home for dinner tonight (Pork loin, broccoli/rice dish, fresh black plums) but I've got the pork marinating right now. He's been busy all this month (and a few more weeks to go) earning the right to wear this lovely item.

Obviously this is nothing fancy. In fact, it isn't even NEW-new. I merely took a piece of a rotating storage unit (scrapbooking storage stuff from Target)  and repurposed it for homeschooling.

At the "bottom" front (6 o'clock position), there is a slew of "clicky pencils" (aka mechanical pencils) that we like as they never go dull, a few regular pencils, and some pens in the plastic cup. To the left of that are erasable colored pencils that we use for mapwork. To the right of the front are some dry erase markers (there is a small dry erase board just to the right of the organizer, out of the photo.)

At the right (3 o'clock position) is a set of Spanish flashcards (which I've had forever and never remember to use them. Thinking if I have them out and in sight, maybe they'll get used.) One deck of 6th grade Brain Quest cards (I got from a used curric. sale, which is why I only have the one deck), a FlashMagic game thingy (for continued drilling of multiplication and division facts... again, this rarely gets used anymore, but thought it might be fun to take out from time to time), and right next to that, you can barely see the tippy top of some triangle multiplication/division flashcards (you guessed right, another thing that rarely gets used. Thinking it will be nice to use these, too, for a bit as we ramp back up from our minimal schooling through the summer.)

At the top (12 o'clock position) is a set of colored pencils for various illustrations that might be needed in her science/history notebooking. Behind those, out of sight in the photograph, are two sets of oil pastels. We have big case of colored pencils that kiddo usually uses for everything, but since I already had this small box of colored pencils on hand (since forever ago!) I figured I might as well pull them out and put them to use. At least this way she won't have to track down where she last used the colored pencils when it is time to do something for school lessons.

And in the final section (9 o'clock position) is a pad of ruled post-it notes, Elmer's Glue (with a "tappy top" from her preschool days, but I just LOVE it's dispensing capabilities!), some Aleene's Tacky Glue (our tried and true go-to friend), some scotch tape, glue sticks, and a tiny dry-erase eraser (the latter items, out of sight in this photo.)

Only thing I need to add (to the 12 o'clock section) is a ruler and two pairs of scissors. We've got supplies galore upstairs in the homeschool/scrapbook room but having this little tote downstairs and handy will be great. It's a step up from our brown cooking cocoa empty container we'd used last year. LOL