Our Back to School Dinner

We started school back in July, Lincoln started preschool and Brynlee started 2nd grade homeschool, our schools are on a modified year round schedule here and usually start the last week of July. This year, of course, has been so different, it just didn’t feel like school was starting, we didn’t go school shopping, we didn’t have meet the teacher, no end of summer parties or playdates. It all just felt off and I wanted to do something to make it feel special for my kids and to set the tone for school starting. I knew that after taking such a long break and then suddenly starting school at home would be an adjustment for Brynlee, to say the least and I hoped that having a themed dinner the night before, with the expectation that school was starting the next morning would help.

Since in person learning is resuming here (it’s been all virtual up to this point), I thought I would share what we did for our dinner and encourage you to host one too, it was a lot of fun, simple to do (thanks to Pinterest) and my kids loved it!

I first saw the idea on Merrick’s Art, she’s been hosting them for years and has lots of ideas on her blog for them. I was short on time, after I made the decision to host a dinner, so I took to Pinterest hoping to find some printables. I didn’t have enough time to order anything and we were quarantining at the time. I found this super cute set up on Pinterest, was able to do order pick up for the red plates and napkins and print everything else.

I think the tablescape turned out so cute. I set everything up during nap and quiet rest time, so the kids were super excited when they came down to see everything decorated. Next year, I’ll plan ahead and include a balloon garland too! I wrote little notes on two of the printed paper sheets and wrote “Brynlee’s 2nd Grade Goals” and “Lincoln’s Preschool Goals” on the other two for them to fill out at dinner.

We chose to have a build your own pizza night, both of my kids favorite foods, with brownies for dessert. During dinner, we talked about school starting the next day, the changes in our schedule and routines that would happen and asked them what they were looking forward to about school this year.

Brynlee was especially excited to fill out her goals for the year. Teaching kids to set goals and to work to achieve them while they are still young them is so important in my opinion. If I can teach them that when you set a goal, you work until you reach it now, by the time they are adults it will be habitual and they will be able to achieve anything they set their mind to!

This has been a fun new tradition and I’m looking forward to continuing it in the years to come.

And we of course continued our tradition of apple pancakes on the first day of school for breakfast. We’ve been doing this tradition since Brynlee was in preschool and my kids love it!

Wishing you all a great school year, no matter what that may look like.