Picket Fence Post

Every school year I start out with the best intentions. Really.

I fill out a family calendar onto which I dutifully note all the important school, family and extra curricular activities. My BlackBerry and The Spouse’s BlackBerry are also inputted with the same schedule. Plus I’ve got a white board (made of metal) in the kitchen onto which I put the list of the week’s events as well as important papers.

I clean out the three-ring binders I bought for the kids years ago and place them in the special shelving unit on which I splurged when I bought from Pottery Barn when the fifth graders started kindergarten.

Then the organization all goes to hell.

Quickly – very, very quickly — I, the designated, unpaid family administrative assistant, become buried in a blizzard of papers and start inadvertently missing things, appointments, etc. For years I’ve written columns and blog entries about how it seems almost impossible to keep on top of the school paperwork the kids bring home and the parents.

This year I’m taking a different approach. I’m going to keep a record of how many pieces of dead trees come home and quantify the papers instead of just gnashing my teeth about them. I’m calling this, “The Paper Project,” where the plan is to tally the number of papers my two fifth graders and my third grader bring home each week.

Anyone willing to put a wager on how many pieces of paper a fifth grader from the suburbs brings home during a school year?