Reception newbie: where do I buy everything, please?

[AblativeAbsolute]

DS1 starts in Reception in September, and I've told him we can go shopping together to get some of his school bits. So, to avoid dragging endlessly round the shops, I want some tips on the best places to go for:

Uniform - grey trousers, pref elasticated or very easy fastening, and black shoes (Clarks?) - I think the rest comes through the school.
Lunchbox and drinks bottle - I'm thinking nice funky colours but not branded characters
Schoolbag/rucksack (ditto)
Anything else? Do they need pencil cases and stuff?

Please don't recommend Tesco, as I hate Tesco we don't have one nearby. Thinking of a trip to Bluewater, so maybe M&S, JL etc?? Help please!

Glittertwins you mean 'better', surely .

If you are near Bluewater, you might also be near Sainsbury's in Crayford? (There's a big one near Gillingham too) They have a good range of school uniform. Depending on how strict the school is you might want to get some cheap spares from there. They also have a large home and leisure department for things like lunch boxes.

My son is in school nursery and what goes in his book bag is reading book, homework, letters, sun hat, jumper, gloves, and whatever he's taking to school for show and tell. I'm assuming the same for reception - I don't remember seeing any child in the infants with a school bag.

I have a fantastic reusable cotton bag from the co-op that goes over my shoulder, and can fit his school coat, (if it's hot) book bag, and PE kit in, so I am hands free for the walk home.

We will probably continue in being "artful" in our recycling of it ;-)

Is this a private school?
If it is, they tend to have VERY distinct rules about uniform and what is and isn't permitted (even down to the lunchbag). You might want to wait for the info day!

No no, it's a state primary.

am full of at swimming day. Ours don't get that til year 3.

Imagine being able to palm off swimming lessons hell offer your child the opportunity to swim at school! Fab!

School swimming starts in year 3 here too.

Just checked, and my reception child's bookbag currently contains:

1. Reading record and two books;
2. Torn phonics book which hasn't been used in a term, but which I can't be bothered to remove;
3. A drawing of the Olympic Rings;
4. A screwed up drawing of a circle with "foot Ball" written underneath;
5. A stick;
6. A price of dried clay (some sort of model?)
7. A jumper.

That's a pretty typical day...

Ah, but the school swimming is not entirely helpful. They do it in Reception, but then not in Ys 1 and 2, so you might not want to give up your private swimming lesson place. Plus, I'm reliably informed that they learn next to nothing, given that it's a baby pool that they can all walk around in, and because they concentrate on the ones who haven't really swum before. So the ones who are halfway competent don't really improve. The upshot of which is, I am (through gritted teeth) carrying on the weekend swimming lesson as well.

DD does swimming in reception. They've taught her in less than a year to swim, float on her front and back and in a ball, swim to the bottom of the pool to retrieve something etc. They have weekly swimming lessons from the week they start in school here. It's a good job as we have no local pool for private lessons. Maybe that's why they're so keen on promoting it at school?

Sainsburys is also good and you will get lunch box etc in there too. It seems to last well and doesn't fade at all.

Also, in DS1s school they are not allowed really to take a rucksack as there is no point, they have a book bag for their reading book, letters, drawings (and usually a jumper/coat squished in to come home!). I got all excited and bought matching rucksack, pencil case etc to then find out on info night he didn't need it. His school are fairly relaxed about uniform and stuff like that.

At DS2s school they do not have a rucksack until Juniors when they start needing 55 different kits/shoes for PE/sports plus all the other crap (hymn book etc) they may require! His school is very particular about uniform and everything - I am struggling with the full A4 page of uniform requirements for him at age 4!!!!

Rucksack - depends how often bookbag sent in. Ours is once a week, so a rucksack is great for letters, dinner money, spare clothes, hat, cardigan / coat if it's hot, waterbottle, artwork et al. Hates picking up other, bagless kids, who come out with stuff they can't hold

Supermarkets are great for schoolwear, lunch boxes etc. M&S and JL sell all the stuff, usually more expensive but they usually have offers if you go early. My DDs prefer acrylic cardigans to cotton (shape and how they feel), I prefer them as they dry overnight. (So much for natural materials...)

For girls, if they have summer uniform, buy some dresses now for September. (Hard to get by September, much easier than blouses, pinafores and ties, and it's often hot when they start school.) Probably applies to some extent to boys' clothes too, OP.

Short sleeved bouses / shirts are better, especially for infants, as there is no cuff button, easier to pull up sleeves and don't have to worry about cuff getting wet with water play / hand washing.

Make sure they have socks that they can put on easily (slight tangent).

They're usually pretty thorough at the information evenings.

parachute no, I love your sock tangent. DS1 is now ok at dressing himself but has real issues with socks. I suspect it's partly because I'm a bit of a sock snob and have always got him Gap socks, on the basis that they don't fall off. But I now think that 'not falling off' equates to 'bloody difficult to put on'. Any recommendations for provenance of easy socks?

Check with water bottles before buying - our primary sells perfectly good ones for £1 & they generally all have the school one. (It does have a space for their name!)

Peacocks do perfectly good socks in big packs very cheap, then you don't need to worry when they lose them/come home in random socks 2 sizes too big etc

And yy remember hat & small tube of suncream (often needed in September)

M&S socks are great, my DD1 has a sock phobia too, but is finding them MUCH easier to put on than all the others I've bought/ been given. Plus, a lot of them have sizes on them so you can easily see which ones should fit. DD1 will be fine for all other clothing but socks are going to take a lot of practice over the summer. She's going to Big School too - we had our new parents' evening last night. They gave us a big pack with lots of lists and info in it. My head's sore from trying to read it all!

Is it ridiculous to start buying uniform now? M&S have a 20% off uniform sale and I have vouchers I need to use anyway for them.

I left it really late to buy a few extras I needed uniform wise and there were no sizes left in most shops so I had to pay higher prices in John Lewis in the end.

I just got the lot yesterday online from M&S

Can I resurrect this thread, please? I now have 'the list' from the school, and have begun to drool over gorgeous personalised bags on the internet . (Apparently I need a PE bag, a swimming bag AND a small drawstring school bag (for water, snack etc), in addition to the book bag which they don't get until a bit later .) Anyway, latest question is about how much of all the uniform I need. I was thinking of:

3 trousers
2 shorts
3 polo shirts (enough??)
2 jumpers
1 PE kit

Thoughts please?

You will need a minimum of 5 polo shirts/shirts, at least 2 jumpers, at least 3/4 prs trousers, spare PE shorts may be needed, unless you run your washing machine daily :) DD gets through has clean clothes daily as the school site can get quite muddy and she manages to find the mud :o

We have to buy some items direct from the school so that makes uniform more expensive (I try to make the jumper last all week, but it doesn't always get there).

I meant to add that I like Sainsbury's and Asda for school uniform. Also, Matalan is quite good. Cheap but reasonably hard-wearing.

I would find out how strict the school is on buying official items - I was advised by the children's centre group worker at my local school to get a couple of logo sweatshirts from school and buy some extras from Sainsburys, and to just get ds1 lots of black tracksuit trousers (he went to nursery class for a year). I think we probably will have to get him some proper trousers as he goes into year 1, but I will be following this advice for DS2 who starts in nursery - he can probably inherit DS1's nursery jumpers but the trousers all get holes in really quickly (so did their last non school trousers from M&S, so it's not just about cost, though if people know of really good quality for a not too expensive price, I would be interested to hear). Her advice was that the logo sweatshirts matter for the day out.