Five Easy Things I’m Doing Right Now to Get Ready for Back to School

Be Well Living / 
Five Easy Things I’m Doing Right Now to Get Ready for Back to School

No elaborate systems. No Sunday marathons. Just five simple things that make the first week of school feel smooth instead of chaotic.

Back to school season has a way of sneaking up on you. One day you’re camping in Big Sur off grid and the next you’re standing in the kitchen at 7am realizing you have no plan and three hungry kids to feed before the bus comes.

I’ve been through enough back to school seasons now to know that a little prep work goes a long way. Not a lot of preparation. Just a little. Mostly, the right kind. The kind that makes the first week feel grounded and calm instead of frantic.

Here are the five simple things I’m doing right now to get our family ready, and why each one matters more than it might seem:.

1. Nailing 3 to 4 Staple Blood Sugar Balancing Breakfasts to Anchor Our Mornings

The single most impactful thing I can do for my boys before they walk out the door is make sure their blood sugar is stable. A high protein, Fab Four breakfast sets the tone for the entire school day. It determines their focus, their mood, their energy levels, and whether they crash by 10am or stay steady until lunch.

I’m not trying to make something different every morning. I’m not scanning Pinterest or saving IG reels for elaborate back to school breakfast inspo. Instead, I’m nailing 3 to 4 breakfasts I know work, that my boys will eat, and that I can make on autopilot. 

Here’s our current rotation:

  1. Eggs and Sausage: The fastest high protein breakfast in our house. Scrambled eggs with grass-fed butter alongside Teton Waters Ranch breakfast sausage and a side of fresh berries. Twenty grams of protein before 8am. Everyone’s happy. And it’s 10 minutes from fridge to table for the entire family.
  2. The Fab Four Smoothie: My non-negotiable for rushed mornings. One scoop of Be Well Protein Powder, frozen berries, almond butter, flax seeds, spinach, and almond milk. Better yet? Double, triple, or adjust the ingredients to your family and make everyone’s in the same blender. It cuts your prep time by three quarters. Five minutes, four nutrients, one glass. I blend the night before on the most chaotic mornings and it’s ready to go straight from the fridge.
  3. Cottage Cheese Egg Bites: A make-ahead breakfast that’s just as nutrient-dense as it is grab-and-go friendly. And absolutely kid-approved!
  4. Protein Overnight Oats or Chia Pudding or Yogurt Bowls: You can mix the base the night before so you have a complete Fab Four breakfast waiting in the fridge before anyone wakes up.

For a deep dive into building blood sugar balancing breakfasts your whole family will love, check out my full guide on Easy High Protein Breakfast Ideas. It covers everything from 30 gram protein combinations to make-ahead options that make school mornings completely effortless. Pick your family’s three or four. Practice them this week to figure out what works. By the first day of school they’ll feel effortless.

2. Moving Bedtime Up in 10-Minute Increments

This one is so simple and so effective, but most families wait until the night before school to try and move bedtime up all at once. It makes for a rough start to the week.

Summer schedules are looser. Bedtimes drift later. Kids are staying up watching one more show or playing outside until it gets dark. And then suddenly we need them up an hour earlier than they’ve been waking up for the past two months.

The fix is gradual. Starting right now I’m moving bedtime earlier by ten minutes every night. Not an hour all at once. Just ten minutes. By the time school starts, we will have shifted the whole schedule naturally without a single meltdown.

The science backs this up completely. Circadian rhythms shift gradually, not abruptly. A ten minute earlier bedtime every night for a week creates a full hour of shift with virtually no resistance from kids or their bodies.

For everyone in my house, Be Well Magnesium is a nightly non-negotiable for deeper, more restorative sleep. The L-Theanine and GABA co-factors help the nervous system wind down more naturally so falling asleep earlier actually works.

Struggling with bedtimes? Listen to Setting Your Kids for Sleep Success with Melissa Brown.

3. Printing a List of Fab Four Snacks to Live on the Fridge

This is the hack I wish someone had told me years ago. Decision fatigue is real and it’s at its worst at 3pm when everyone is hungry and tired and looking to me to figure out what to eat. When the right snack list is already on the fridge, I don’t have to think. I just look, grab, and done.

I’m printing out a simple list of approved Fab Four snacks that hit protein or healthy fat in every combination and sticking it right at eye level on the fridge. When the boys walk in the door after school they can look at the list and grab what they want. When I’m packing lunchboxes in the morning, I can glance at the list and stop thinking.

Here’s what’s going on our fridge list:

Protein Options:

  • Hard boiled eggs
  • Chomps or Paleovalley beef sticks
  • String cheese or Babybel
  • Turkey roll-ups
  • Greek yogurt with berries

Fat and Fiber Options

  • Almond butter with apple slices
  • Guacamole or hummus with veggie sticks
  • Raw Almonds or Cashews
  • Olive and Roasted Veggie Packs
  • Avocado with grain-free crackers

Sweet Treats That Work:

Print it. Laminate it if you want to be extra about it. Put it on the fridge. Stop thinking about snacks.

For more Fab Four snacks and lunchbox ideas, check out:

4. Doing a Big Pantry Clean Out + Stock-Up Order

Nothing derails a healthy back to school week faster than opening the pantry and finding nothing useful. I do one big Thrive Market order before school starts every single year and it’s one of the highest leverage things I do for our family's nutrition all month long.
When the right ingredients are already in the house, the good choices become the easy choices. No last minute grocery runs at 6pm. No reaching for whatever is convenient.

Just a stocked pantry that supports the breakfasts, lunches, and snacks I’ve already planned. Here’s what I am ordering before school starts:

Pantry Staples:

  • Siete grain-free tortilla chips and grain-free crackers
  • Simple Mills crackers and almond flour products
  • Mary's Gone Crackers
  • Lesser Evil organic popcorn snack packs
  • Chomps and Paleovalley beef sticks
  • Seaweed snacks in avocado oil
  • Single serve nut butter packets (Justin's or Once Again)
  • Thrive Market individual olive packets
  • Brami Lupini bean snacks

Fridge and Freezer:

  • Hard boiled eggs (or ingredients to make a big batch Sunday)
  • Organic string cheese
  • Teton Waters Ranch breakfast sausages
  • Jesse and Ben's beef tallow fries
  • Frozen berries for smoothies
  • Unsweetened almond milk

Supplement Stack:

For my complete family grocery guide with every staple I keep stocked, where I buy each one, and what’s on auto-ship, grab the Be Well Grocery Guide.

5. Being Completely Present for These Last Days of Summer

This is the one that matters most and the one most of us skip because we’re already in our heads about school starting.

I am making a conscious choice right now to stop rushing toward September and actually be here for the end of summer. Moving my body with my kids outside. Laughing. Swimming. Saying yes to the board game, the bike ride, or the evening surf. Letting the final summer days be slow and unscheduled and exactly what they are.

Sebastian, Taschen, and Julian are only this age once. And the way I feel about back to school has everything to do with whether I showed up fully for the days before it arrived.

This is also genuinely good for my health. Time outdoors, physical movement with people I love, real laughter, and the nervous system down regulation that comes from slowing down are not luxuries. They are foundational to the kind of resilience that carries me through the busy season ahead.

So before I check one more thing off the list or think one more thought about school supplies and schedules, I’m going outside. And I am being completely, unapologetically there. With them. 

The Bottom Line

Five things. None of them are complicated. None of them require a full Sunday in the kitchen, hours of prep, or loads of money.

Nail your breakfast rotation. Move bedtime earlier gradually. Print the snack list. Stock the pantry. And soak up the last days of summer with the people who matter most.
Back to school is coming. And you are more ready than you think.

More Helpful Resources:

Looking for more back to school resources? Read The Ultimate Hub for a Healthy Back to School for my complete guide to family nutrition, sleep, immunity, and meal prep for the whole school year.

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