Sunday Smorgasbord

Oh me, oh my. What a hectic week!!  I'm linking up with Michelle over at Fabulous in First again today!

My week started off with an amazing PD session, we made interactive math notebooks!! They kept us BUSY cutting, gluing, taping, cutting, laminating, stapling, and creating ... ALL DAY!!!

 

I can't wait to share some of the amazingness of this with you all....but I have decided that it will be a slow sharing process.  I'm going to share it as I create mine with my class & then attach what I can as freebies to all of you! 

I was able to get into my classroom this week, too!!  I feel like I was able to get a lot accomplished.... however, I still have SO. MUCH. MORE. to do!! 

 

Please excuse the messiness of those cubbies!!! Remember I have to COMPLETELY pack up everything in my room, so I store in every nook & cranny!   I was able to get both of my back wall bulletin boards covered & ready to go!! I generally leave the bulletin boards empty until we make anchor charts to fill them up with!!! I did however add the alphabet for my word wall!!

Fun Fact: You can get twin flat sheets at Wal-Mart for $4 that work great for bulletin boards!! 

We have massive back wall bulletin boards as you can see & the flat sheet side ways fits it PERFECTLY!!! I mean when you think about the cost of fabric by the yard... You save TONS!!!

If you've never used hand signals, you're missing out!!  Last year I made signs for hand signals & refusing to look back on the idea!!  They worked amazing & because I decided to change things around a bit, I created new ones this year!! You can grab them FREE as a Facebook Fan for a limited time!! :)

One of my baby brothers played in the Super Series World Series this week... which means we watched A LOT of baseball!!!! They did great & even were able to play one of their final games at the Dell Diamond!! 

I also created & uploaded .... probably OVER a week ago..... one of my newest units, Snapshots Through the Year!  It is probably one of the things I am most excited about doing with my kids this year!!  I just now seem to be getting around to sharing about it!!

The idea behind this unit was to have a place for students, teacher, and parents to be able to see where they started the year and ended the year.  Students can see their progress with writing, handwriting, and their artistic abilities over the course of the year by using this.  While I have no intention of grading this, I think it is going to end up being a great little memory book for students & their parents!!

There are covers for Kinder through 5th and each grade has 5 different types of covers.  There is one with just the shape of a childs body, no hair.  Then there are two girl and two boy versions.  You can get as specific or as generic as you want with these.  The kids will end up designing the faces and coloring the hair to make it look like their self.

There are monthly pages with a special back to school and summer version.  With each month there is a polaroid style frame for students to share something special that month, these things range from their favorite new piece of school supplies to their best friend.  Each month is different & requires different things for students to write about and share.

I've also included a snapshot page for students to fill out about their teacher.  Like the covers there are 5 versions, however the snapshots are different than the kids! :)

And to add a little fun & a few pages they can fill out throughout the year or at the end of the year, I added a few more pages about important people around school, field trips, field day, favorite memories, and autographs.

You can get this unit in my TPT store by clicking here, it is on Sale until Wednesday! 

I hope this wasn't too scrambled up for you!! ;)  Happy Sunday!

Sunday Smorgasbord

It's Sunday and boy does it feel like one!  We have been L-A-Z-Y this morning & the fact that I have professional development in the morning, which makes it a REAL Sunday, doesn't help!  I am linking up with Michelle from Fabulous in First today!  For me, random and all over the place is how I feel most of my posts are so this should be easy for me! :)

I'm going to start of with B's room!  She upgraded to a BIG girl bed right before her birthday & mommy got new furniture, so it was only natural that I just redo her whole room, right?!?!  When I bought my house and moved in 2+ years ago, no painting happened.  The cream walls stayed because I was almost 7 months preggers!  I was just happy to get everything in the house, unpacked, and set up for her arrival!!! Two years later, you can only imagine how ready I've been to get some color on these walls!!  I just painted one wall in her room and one wall in my room for now, but I'm in love with how cute her painted wall turned out, plus she is SUPER proud of it herself!! She shows everyone that comes to the house!! love.  :)

Here is the before picture of the wall I painted.  plain. jane. .... sorry for the awful quality..... I rely on my iphone too much... must find camera charger!!

 Here is the after shot.  You can vagually see the pattern on the wall.... the next picture down has better lighting!  I made her sign, thanks to a sign I saw on pinterest!  I also made the teal and pink cross frame.  There is really no theme to her room... just lots of vibrant colors!  I plan to find more to add to the wall, but for now... this is it!

I shared some pictures of B's birthday on my post Friday.... but I forgot these & couldn't resist sharing!! If you follow me on instagram, you've probably already seen them!! :)

Can you tell how much B loved getting her nails done or as she calls it "pretties mommy!"

So I never explained a BIG part of the reason for my blogging hiatus.... My grandmother went into the hospital two weeks ago.  After spending a week there she was finally able to go home!  I spent two nights, plus several days that we went to visit on top of that with her!  I'm sure anyone who has had family, friends, or personally been in the hospital can agree that it is plain exhausting!  We also have gone to spend a couple days with her at home, too!! Here is a picture of B enjoying her ice cream at Nene's house!! Can you say spoiled??? 

 Beyond that we've been PAINTING!

 Singing and playing instruments! (dancing too, it's hard to get an action shot of that though!)

We've also tried to do quite a bit of swimming!! This was a day at our community water park! 

I managed to FINALLY get my BTS math centers D.O.N.E!  I've redone several of the centers, several times to get it all just right! I'm so excited about these and how many ways I was able to suggest and offer ways to differentiate in these!!

 I originally planned on doing 12 centers, but with all of the differentiation activities, I nixed a few of my original activities!  One was a number pattern one, that I actually made into a freebie that I featured in Friday's post! Click on the pictures to take a closer look or go download the preview in my TPT store.

You can get them {here} on sale for the next 48 hours... or lets just say until Monday night Tuesday night at Midnight for $4!  That is definitely a steal!  I can't wait to get them printed off tomorrow!!   Now my todo list continues!! I was eager to get done with these so I can start on the next things on my list!! :)  

I will leave you with the sweetest picture that just melts my teacher heart!

 What teacher wouldn't love their kids falling asleep reading?!?! She ALWAYS has to sleep with whatever book(s) we've read that night before bed!! Love!

Would you agree that this has been slightly random?!?!  It's hard to believe summer is almost halfway over! :(