Miss M Monday!

Since I have been out of blogging for so long, I just wanted you to see how much my sweet little M has grown. She is now 2 1/2 and talking all the time. I love hearing what she is going to say next. She is just SOOOOO funny!


Miss M was the angel in our church Christmas play. She was so beautiful dressed in her costume!

Christmas Break Is Here!!



YAH! Yesterday was our last day of school before Christmas break and boy am I glad to have a break! My group of 2nd graders have been soooooo busy for the last week! Now I am excited to spend the Christmas holiday with my family and friends. Today we start our Christmas celebrations with my dad's family.


I just wanted to share a picture of how the front of my house looks all decorated for Christmas...of course Miss Macy had to pop in the picture too! I was proud of the way my new wreaths look on my windows!

Merry Christmas to you all! Maybe I can pop on after Christmas and give you some picture updates on what Santa brings Miss Macy!

Christmas Parent Gifts

I just wanted to pop on and share with you what I made my students' parents this year for Christmas. I wanted to do something different than I have done in the past since I have a student in my class this year (2nd grade) that I taught in kindergarten. Since I didn't have any "great" ideas popping into my head, I went searching on Pinterest (I don't know what I did before we had it!). I found a great idea where a mom had made silhouettes of her children and framed them for gifts. Well I decided to make them of my students and make ornaments out of them!

First I took each students side profile picture. This works well if you take their picture with a window as the background where there is a lot of light and you get a well defined image outline. Then I printed them off on my black and white printer in my classroom. Since I wanted them smaller and more ornament sized, I printed them 3 1/2 x 5" size. BTW: The smaller the size, the more tedious cutting them out is! Then I laid each child's picture on a piece of black construction paper and with my fine point scissors, I cut out their silhouettes. Then I glued them to the cardstock oval I made dated with the year and laminated them. Then I tied a red ribbon through the top for them to hang on the Christmas tree.

Here is what the finished products look like:

I think they are just precious and I am sure the parents will love hanging them on their tree year after year. I know that today is the last day of school for most places before Christmas, but I think they would make great Valentine's or Mother's Day! They would be great to do in a 5x7" frame!

WOW! I have been MIA for TOO Long!

I am so sorry that I have neglected my little blog for so long, but my life has had a lot of changes in the past 6 months. I haven't been as faithful posting since I had our little girl Macy who is now 2 1/2! She keeps me busy, busy, busy when I am at home! She is not the reason I haven't been on my blog as much though...


During the summer, I got the phone call that I dreaded getting. My principal decided that I needed to move to 2nd grade! Needless to say, I PANICKED!!! I have never taught 2nd grade! I loved kindergarten! I had taught kindergarten for 4 years! I loved my TA! I just couldn't do it! But I didn't get a choice...I was moving! So after a few good cries and being very upset, I packed up my whole life in kindergarten, took home loads of things I wouldn't leave behind and stored them in my attic (thank goodness I have a BIG one!), and moved into my itty bitty 2nd grade classroom.


Fast forward to 5 months later, I am teaching a class of 18 active but sweet 2nd graders with a great team of teachers. It is very different from kindergarten and what I was used to but I am adjusting (at least on most days) well. Thank goodness for some great people to work with.


Now that my little update is over, I just want you to know that I still have all my kindergarten materials on my blog and TpT store, but you will begin to see more 2nd grade materials posted too. I also am planning to have an update done to my blog to make it more current with my new position...and a little more generic in case I get moved again! Thank goodness I can't teach any higher than 3rd grade with my ECE degree! :)


Thanks for listening to my little rant! Only 5 more school days!! YAH!!

Currently - June 2015

This is my last week of school (ONLY 4 more days!). I think I can make it now! As much as I love this group of kinders, I cannot wait for summer break - NO alarm clocks, NO early bedtimes!! YAH!!

In honor of the start of a new month, I am linking up with Farley for her June Currently Linky Party.

I am so looking forward to my summer lovin'! I can't wait to spend all summer with my baby girl waking up whenever she feels like it and getting to read fun books to her and hopefully read some for me too! I hope you all have a great summer as well. I know I probably won't be on my blog much this summer since Macy is now 2 and quite busy, but I will try to check in from time to time! 

Happy Summer!!

Five for Friday - May 22, 2015

Today I am linking up with Doodle Bugs Teaching for her Five for Friday linky party. The past two weeks have been BUSY but I will be saying that until the last day of school on June 5th! I am catching you up on the last 2 weeks since my last post!

Last week started off with a wonderful surprise! Our Jr. Beta club decided to host a teacher appreciation breakfast (with some help from their parents). They dressed up the front walkway of our school like the red carpet and had signs stating that teachers are stars! They even had gold stars taped down on the floor with each teacher's name written on one. It was absolutely adorable and the food was delicious!

This past weekend we celebrated my sweet M's 2nd birthday. We did a ladybug theme for my lil' lady. I loved everything about her birthday party, but it sure made for a tired mommy!

Last week our butterflies finally came out of their chrysalises. We released them last Friday. The Painted Lady Butterflies were so pretty and my kinders loved seeing them come out of the net.

I don't have a picture of this one, but I only have 9 more school days until Summer Break!! Yah! I can't wait to spend the summer with my sweet Macy, family and friends!

Finally, I am going to leave you with a fun Friday freebie for all my other kindergarten teachers! I created this cute "Last Day of K" banner to take my kinders pictures. I thought it was absolutely adorable. We are having a kindergarten graduation on June 3rd but there is too much going on between now and then so I took their last day pictures today for their memory books. If you would like this freebie click on the link below and please leave me some feedback:

Last Day of K banner

Now head on over to Doodle Bugs Teaching blog to see all the other photos from this week! Have a great weekend!

What I'm Loving Wednesday - May 13, 2015

I know I haven't been posting on a regular basis like I was before I became a mommy but picking up the new job title comes with some more important activities that need to be completed in the afternoons. With that thought in mind, I decided today would be a prefect day to do a quick What I'm Loving Wednesday post.

1 - Springtime activities with my little one
This past week we went and picked strawberries in a local strawberry patch. Macy ate plenty of them too as you can see from the strawberry juice around her mouth!

2 - Watching my flowers bloom around my house
The amaryllis have been in full bloom and they are beautiful! I love watching these flowers bloom every year. My day lilies are also blooming although I don't have a picture of them.

3 - That the end of the school year is almost here
We only have 16 school days with kiddos left! I can't believe it but I am excited about summer vacation with my little one! She is so much fun.

So what are you loving this Wednesday??

Teacher Appreciation Sale Goodies

During the TpT Teacher Appreciation Sale last week, I stocked up on some goodies that have been sitting on my wish list for a while. I thought I would share these goodies with you as well as how I am planning or using them in my classroom.

I have been looking to update my word wall for next year. This is a great word wall set where the vowel cards have red font to help my kinders distinguish between the consonants and vowels. The word cards included are the Dolch words. I don't teach all of them in kindergarten but I will pick and choose the ones we teach. 

This is a great unit that I found. I am already using activities from it in my lesson plans for the next 3 weeks as the school year comes to a close. I love teaching about the ocean and these new activities will spice up my unit.

This is a Fundraiser for a baby who is very sick. This is a great bundle of clipart at an exceptional value. I was so happy to be able to support such a great cause.

This ocean creatures bundle is such a cute set of clipart from Educlips. I love her work and I can't wait to get started creating new activities for my ocean unit with this cute clipart. 

So what did you purchase during the big sale??

Five for Friday - May 8, 2015

Today I am linking up with Doodle Bugs Teaching for her Five for Friday linky party. This week has been BUSY but aren't they all at this point in the school year! Our school has pre-k through fifth grade. Yesterday and today our 4th and 5th graders had to take the SC PASS on the computer so my TA was pulled!

My kinders made these adorable framed pictures of themselves for their moms for Mother's Day. I thought they were really cute. I took their pictures holding the sign on the playground under our tree and had them printed. Then they picked 2-3 puzzle pieces and my TA hot glued the puzzle pieces on with a magnet on the back. I hope the moms will love them as much as we did!

We have been studying ocean animals this week and will continue for the next 3 weeks. We learned about sharks and this was what one of my kinders wrote for her science journal. I thought her recall of facts was amazing and her pictures were so cute!

On Wednesday afternoon, I took my sweet little one to pick strawberries for the first time. We have a local strawberry patch about 20 minutes from our house. She loves eating strawberries, but was absolutely amazed at being able to pick them. She was eating them straight off of the bushes! It was such a memorable experience for both of us!

My mom packed these strawberries with this sweet note for me yesterday. I love getting sweet things like this from my baby girl!

I received these two sweet gifts from two of my precious kinders this week for Teacher Appreciation week. I was so touched!

Only 19 more school days!!! Enough said...YAH!! 

Now head on over to Doodle Bugs Teaching blog to see all the other photos from this week! Have a great weekend!

Currently - May 2015

Wow! I can't believe it is already May! I know I am a couple of days late to the party but in honor of the start of a new month, I am linking up with Farley for her Currently May linky party. I haven't done this in a few months so I thought this month would be a fun one to jump back in!

Here's a little explanation of my Currently.

Needing: My sweet little Macy is turning 2 in less than 2 weeks. I have got to finish creating all her birthday decorations. I am doing a ladybug theme! (If you have any ideas, please send them my way!)

Summer Yes: The week after we get out of school for summer, my little family is going to see Thomas the Train at Tweetsie Railroad in Blowing Rock, NC. Macy is infatuated with Thomas and I know she will be so excited!! 
Summer Hope: I am hoping to spend some days this summer back at the lake relaxing. It is a great mini-vacay for my family since this is a perk of where my hubby works.
Summer Dream: I would love to go on another cruise with my family. We went last year before Macy was 1 and had such a good time. I would love to go on a Disney cruise this time!

Well I hope you enjoyed seeing a little peek into my world! 

Teacher Appreciation Sale!!

TpT is hosting a Teacher Appreciation Sale where you can save up to 28% off most products. My entire store is on sale for 20% off and with the code: ThankYou you can save another 10% off!!! Please click on my logo below to head over to my store! 

I am off to do some shopping myself now!!

Five for Friday - May 1, 2015

Today I am linking up with Doodle Bugs Teaching for her Five for Friday linky party. This week has brought lots of new challenges. I teach in a large elementary school with about 800 students in grades pre-k through fifth so this week our upper grades (3rd-5th) have been taking the ACT Aspire which is the new state standardized test for SC. Because they need monitors in their classrooms, my TA has been pulled everyday for most of the day. This also meant that we had a shortened special area schedule which meant less planning time so I have had a very tiring week!

Last week on Friday afternoon, we had some new visitors arrive to our classroom - 6 Painted Lady caterpillars! We recieved these caterpillars through a grant by our local International Paper mill! My kinders and I were both so excited about their arrival! They have been amazed at how much they have grown in just a few days. I can't wait to see their faces as they form chrysalises and grow into butterflies!

This week we have studied plants. We talked about the life cycle of a plant and made this anchor chart (I am NOT an artist!). Then my kinders drew their own life cycles and wrote about it. This little guy did a great job on his writing!

We made this flipbook from Kindergarten Crayons where they had to sort the plant pictures by the number of syllables. This was a great review for my kinders while I was assessing for interims.

This was an idea one of the other kindergarten teachers saw on a blog. She made picture vocabulary cards of plants that either grow above or below the ground. Then my kinders helped me sort them to make this anchor chart. This was a great activity because they got to use the vocabulary they have learned all week.

This afternoon our school did a balloon release to raise money for Relay for Life. Our school is a big supporter of Relay for Life in our community. This is the first time we have done this particular fundraiser but it turned out well. The kids were so excited!

Now head on over to Doodle Bugs Teaching blog to see all the other photos from this week! Have a great weekend!