My End-of-School-Year Reset: Systems, Sentiment, and Simplicity
How I wrap up the school year with less clutter and more meaning.
There’s something about the end of the school year that feels a little rusty—like we’re in between rhythms and still shaking off the momentum of spring. Each year before I dive fully into summer mode, I’ve developed a simple, meaningful system to wrap up the school year well. It’s not perfect, but it’s become a rhythm I return to year after year—part decluttering, part memory-keeping, part peace-giving. Every time I talk about this on instagram, yall ask me more about it.
So here’s a short list of what I do. If you have more specific questions, ask in the comments and I would love to help.
✿ Backpacks, Notebooks & Papers: The Ruthless Sort
The first thing I tackle is the kids’ backpacks and all the paper piles that come home—worksheets, writing journals, notebooks. I go through everything quickly:
Trash/Recycle what we don’t need.
Save a few meaningful things: sweet notes, funny stories, prayer journals, or anything they might want to look back on.
Reuse supplies if possible. If a notebook still has life in it, I tear out the used pages and store it in a supply bin in my office.
This step alone clears out so much clutter and helps me mentally end the school year.
✿ Kid Art: Document, Frame, or Let It Go
For my preschool and elementary-aged kids, I sort through the year’s artwork. Whether it came home in one giant portfolio or trickled in throughout the year into our laundry room file slots, I’ve developed a system that makes it manageable and memorable:
Photograph each piece in good natural light and upload them to each child’s personal “Kid Art” folder in Google Photos.
Add the photos to a drafted Chatbook—one per child. It’s not organized by year, just a simple ongoing draft that I’ll print when they finish elementary school.
Trash art that doesn’t feel meaningful
Store seasonal art with decorations (e.g. Easter crafts go in the Easter bin).
Frame a few favorites for our kid art gallery wall and swap them out every few years.
This way, I’m not drowning in paper piles, but we still celebrate and preserve what matters.
Details: Once they finish “Elementary school art” class, then I print the Chatbook and forever have documentation of all the beautiful things they made.
✿ Life Tubs: Memory Keeping That Won’t Overwhelm Them Later
Each child has a weatherproof “Life Tub” with labeled folders for each school year (birth–12th grade). Every June, I:
Add their school photo, report cards, class list, teacher name, and a few special pieces that capture them that year. Maybe in second grade it’s what they want to be when they grow up, or in middle school it’s a self evaluation. You don’t have to save it all, just a few pieces that will remind you of their growth that year.
Store awards, sweet notes, or dreams (“I want to be a vet!”) that feel worth saving.
This system was born from a personal story: during COVID, my parents gave me 35 tubs worth of stuff they had saved for me. It took me weeks to go through. I don’t want that for my kids—so I’m doing the work now to curate just one meaningful tub each.
Bonus tip: sometimes I pull out older folders and ask myself, “Why did I save this?” If it doesn’t feel necessary anymore, I toss it. I find I’m more willing to let go with a few years of distance.
Details: These are the tubs I use. They are 32 quart! For some reason it’s hard to find a single, but depending on how many kids you have - there are variety of packs. The size is perfect for hanging file folders!
Get dividers for each grade /year — I have file folders that are labeled starting at 0-3, pre k, 1, 2, 3, etc all the way until 12th grade.
✿School-Year Photos: One Folder Per Kid
If your school or teacher sends monthly updates, or if there’s a shared folder of photos from events, now is a great time to download and organize those. I:
Create a Google Photos album for each child labeled by grade with the school year (ex: 2024-2025).
Add all the class party pics, field day, and school snapshots to it.
(One day I might make a Chat book just from school moments—but even having them saved and sorted is a win for now.)
This process has become a small but sacred part of our summer rhythm. It gives me closure, clarity, and the joy of knowing I’ve captured the most meaningful pieces—without needing to hold onto everything.
Whether you do one of these things or all of them, I hope it inspires a peaceful reset as you move into summer. And if you’re curious about our Life Tub setup, I’ll link the full post on that here.
✿My Encouragement to YOU!!!
If you’ve never considered creating a “rhythm” around any of these tasks, start with ONE THING! It’s really easy to feel overwhelmed or “behind” and want to do it all right now. Maybe this year you start organizing things to put into a Life Tub, or maybe you start a Chatbook of your kids art. Just know all of these things were birthed for me over years and not all at once.
Chose something that matters to you and your family, and start there!
I also created this very simple PDF checklist for you to print out, and keep handy while you do your own end of school year reset. I hope it helps you!
