Back to School Shopping Trips

I swear the stores try to make summer end early- they put back to school supplies out on display in mid June. I don't like seeing everything out so early, but when we get to August I definitely look forward to taking each of the kids on their special 'Back to School' shopping trip. I love taking each of them by themselves to get a couple things. They really didn't need a whole lot (other than the mile-long school supply list...) but it's still fun to pick out a couple things and get a bite to eat together.

Matthew was the lucky one who got the first trip- actually Jeff had a little break between patients, so I took him when I could. He was pretty excited about his new Lightning McQueen shirt, and ice cream cone from Dairy Queen.

I ended up taking Jacob the same day as Matthew once Jeff got home from work. I normally let the kids pick out a treat or eat somewhere cheap, but Jacob had asked on his birthday to go to Red Lobster and we weren't able to go, so I let him go for his school shopping trip. Thank goodness they have cheap lobster on the kids menu- he'd been dying to try it forever, and was so excited to go to a real restaurant. We don't take kids very often for obvious reasons. Jacob thought it was pretty awesome- especially when the server let him touch one of the live lobsters.

Caleb was the last one to go. He always cracks me up with his pictures, I had to put in a couple of my favorite poses of his. He was so excited when he found a Mario shirt on the clearance rack at Target, and also thought it was pretty cool to get a kids' meal for lunch while we were there.


And we're done again for another year. I didn't take Emily- I figure she'll have plenty of time with me while the boys are at school. I'm so glad my mom started this tradition with us when we were kids. We used to draw names for the order we'd go in, and get so excited to see what everyone would find. It's so fun to go enjoy a couple hours one on one with each of my kids, and I'm pretty sure they enjoyed it as much as I did.