Where Are My Animal Friends?

We had an absolute FANTASTIC Monday today!  The kids were Great!  We are loving place value, learning comparative endings –er and-est, and Deanna Jump’s Penguin unit is rounding out our day with some A-W-E-S-O-M-E activities.  If you need a fun unit go get it now at TpT and then go HERE for Abby’s 5 unit. Instant lesson planning!  What more could a VERY busy teacher/coach/fiance/wedding planner/cook/maid/etc/etc/etc ask for??? haha!  Can’t wait to post our take on the unit and see how the art activity turns out.

For centers this week I took Abby’s Monster Munch (can you tell that I stalk Babbling Abby and can’t WAIT for her new Blog!) and made a sort using –er and –est. Click HERE and HERE for the google doc. download.  I still haven’t figured out HOW in the WORLD to get the document to show up in the blog.  I don’t remember how I got the PowerPoint in the earlier post to do.  haha!  I need to take a class.  SERIOUSLY!

*The Awesome clip art is from Lettering Delights!

 

100th Day of School

This past week was the 100th day of school!  It is such a fun day!  The kids get sooo excited about it and it is a great day to incorporate all kinds of reading, writing, and math activities.  Our reading story was I’m a Caterpillar and it went GREAT with The Very Hungry Caterpillar.  So one of our activities was to compare and contrast with a Venn Diagram (forgot to take a picture).  Then we partnered up and the kids made ten circles on a piece of paper to make a caterpillar with 100 total circles.  We then brainstormed 100 foods the caterpillar would eat!  The kids LOVED this. We also made butterflies with our hands and figured out how many dots we would each have on our butterflies to make one hundred.  It worked out great that my 6 year olds made 6 dots and my 7 year olds made 7 dots.  We also made a chain of 10 different colors with 10 links each.  Place Value lesson: Make Ten, Turn It In!  I’ll leave you with a few not so good pictures..I need a new camera.

*Caterpillar and link ideas were from Chalk Talk: A Kindergarten Blog.

      

Making the Most of the Snow!

This past week has been 12 kinds of crazy!  I had a touch of something that kept me in the bed a day or so, 100th day of school, softball started back, MY SISTER GOT ENGAGED!  Whew, that’s a lot!  I am going to post some pictures of our snowman unit from Deanna Jump and Snow Day Data from first grade parade.   

I’m a Caterpillar

If the reading series Reading Street could have anything else packed in to one story they would need to change the name to Reading City.  There is always sooo much to pack in throughout the week.  I somehow get it done, but it is a miracle.  I made a list of things that I have to run off every week and it was over 20 things! WOW that was just for reading…. (Parents this is why paper is on my wishlist every week)!  I incorporate the skills in reading centers, whole group reading, intervention, and my unit of study in the afternoon.  I am going to attempt to paste some things we have done this week… I am still unsure of how to get all of the pages into one download since I make them separate.  I want to clarify that most of the clip art is from Scrappin Doodles or Lettering Delights.  If anybody wants to help me clarify their terms of use so I don’t get sued I would love the help.  Okay click on the picture to enjoy the downloads, maybe they will help you or give you an idea or two for the next week. 

test

It worked!  Whoooo hooo!  Actually the acutal PP is a little messed up, some of the fonts and sizing, but I figured it out! I can go to bed.... I will post a sort, recording sheet, and warm up words tomorrow to go along with I'm a Caterpillar.

Make It with Marshmallows

At school last week and this week we have been knee deep in snowman activities.  If you haven’t picked up Deanna Jumps Snowman Unit from Teachers Pay Teacher, then head on over and purchase it right now!  Doesn’t it seem like everybody else’s ideas are sooo good?  I have noticed that even though I have ideas (good ones every now and then) I find my self stalking everyone else’s blog and using their ideas.  So I am leaving you today with an idea that is circulating around in Blogland…

It is a marshmallow snowman…so cute!  We are taking two days to make this which I recommend unless you have a lot of time. 

First, we read The Biggest, Best Snowman.  It is the PERFECT book to go with this activity.  The book sequences the building of a snowman.  After we finish putting on the “decorashuns.” We are going to do a directional four step writing on how to build a snowman. I will be take pictures of our snowmen and the writings later in the week.

 

*PS- Do you ever find that  great idea and the pictures all of the other teachers put up are so good? and you do that same activity and your class just “doesn’t get it.”  I can get so frustrated.  We did the …If I live in a snowglobe writing and I had answers like I would fall down from being dizzy because everybody would shake me up and then I would throw up…. REALLY?  haha Abby didn’t have any answers like that! Maybe it has to do with the 12 boys in my class.  Hopefully our snowman will go better.  Check back for pictures of all of our snowman activities and go get Deanna Jump’s unit!

The Cake

I Love Wedding Cake.  Like Love It.  I knew when we first started planning that I wanted to have not only a great looking cake, but a great TASTING cake.  So many times you go to a wedding and the cake is AMAZINGLY beautiful but it doesn’t takes very good or it is crooked and the icing is messy but it tastes great.  I found my “cake lady” as I call her from the girls at my school.  Whenever we have a special occasion they always order a cake from Amy’s Cakes.  I knew that she was definitely in the running to make my cake.  I knew the deal was sealed when my mom and I made our appointment and momma tasted the cake and loved it.  Amy was so sweet and accommodating, she painted the cake while we were there, let us taste different flavors, etc, I recommend her for any occasion.  I was having a hard time making a decision about what colors to use on the cake and she suggested that we have her make a birthday cake with half one way and half the other.  SO SMART!  I can’t wait to see which one I pick. It is going to me a 5 layer cake with flowers in between layers.  It is going to consist of white cake with a super good buttercream icing.  There will be a lemon layer, a raspberry layer, and a layer with fresh strawberries (yum)!  I will leave you with some inspiration pictures for the cake:

Picture courtesy of Weddings by Lisa.

  

Pictures Courtesy of Style me Pretty.

          

Pictures Courtesy of The Knot:

      

 

     

and the winner is :

 

I love this cake.  It will probably be off white with tan dots and pink ribbon.  I am going to use brooches from members of my family and the flowers will the all different colors.  The topper will be a very sparkly L like this: (yes I know this is a M)

Can’t wait to show you a picture of the cake that day!  Only 167 Days left! 

Playing Catch Up

Last week I was back tracking and this week I am playing catch up…is that the same thing?  I am trying to learn how to do all of this fun new techie stuff, but sadly I am not getting it quite as fast as I would like.  I would like to thank Cara, Sarah, and Ladybug Teacher for helping me out with some questions I have had come up.  So I blog teacher talk on Wednesday but I will tell you what I have been wanting.  haha I took a picture of this “must have” glitter sequin tube top at Wal-Mart, but not even I can pretend that I or anybody in their right mind would want that. But what I do want is a CIRCUIT (pronounced Cricket from where I come from for whatever reason) or a Silhouette.

     

 

They are amazing little machines that can do just about anything. I REALLY want one…. REALLY bad!

Guess What?  Thursday it snowed.  That’s right that awful white stuff fell from the sky and left about an inch dusting on our yards, cars, and houses.  The good thing about this snow was instead of NO school (which would lead to going to school on Saturday) we were delayed 2 hours Friday morning!  A girl could get used to that!  So on Thursday, I was thankful for a good call by our superintendent.

For Free Choice Friday, I just wanted to tell you how great the sight Scrappin Doodles is.  They have clip art for $1 and it is really good clip art.  I am loving putting together worksheet and center work for my kiddos next week for our story I’m a Caterpillar.

I am in B’ham, AL for the weekend.  The wedding update will probably be Sunday, but I will be talking about the cake! Yummy!

Frog and Toad Together: The Garden

Our reading street story this week is Frog and Toad Together: The Garden.  Our main skills are inflected endings –ed and –ing when you have to double up the consonant, –ar words, plot, and past and present tense verbs!  (You think they could’ve add more more thing?)

I have been stalking everybody else’s blog and just love love love all the ideas and clip art and activities so I download me some clip art from Scrappin Doodles and Lettering Delights and got busy. I haven’t really had a lot of time to play around with it but I will leave you with a plot activity where students can draw a picture of what happened and then add a picture, –ar words to warm up with in small groups, and another –ar word activity to go along with the decodable or the story.  Enjoy!

*Okay sO I just thought I knew what I was doing!  Its 12:08 and I started this post at 10:15!  I will work on the Google documents and post more tomorrow! For now…if your still up just click on the links to see the documents.

A Taste of Summertime

With all of this winter weather we’ve been having I decided to spice things up a notch…. in the kitchen!  If you would have told me 3 years ago that I would have a blog with a recipe on it that I cooked I would have laughed in your face!  Don’t even get me started on what my parents and sister would’ve said.  I used to not know how to cook At. All.  but I’ve slowly learned how and I have super yummy  and healthy recipe  for today.

Summertime Chicken and Salsa

You will need:

Chicken Breast Strips

One can of Mexican Lime and Cilantro Ro*Tel

Lemon

Orange

Salt and pepper

Place chicken strips in a baking dish and sprinkle on lime juice from Ro*Tel

Give a good coat of lemon and orange juice and salt and pepper.

Turn chicken over and repeat!

We grilled them on the grill, but you could cook them however suits your needs.

Next the sauce. You will need:

The same can of Ro*Tel

Jalapeños

Garlic

Lemon

Frozen Pineapple Chunks

Salt and Pepper

*Hot Salsa

Instructions:

Put the whole can of Ro*Tel in a mixing bowl.

Dice up about 10 jalapeños (more if you like it hotter)

1/2 tsp of garlic

Squeeze lemon juice in

Slice about 20 pineapple cubes and add

Most of the time I add some onion, but I didn’t have any so again optional.

*If you are feeding lots of people or if you want to make the salsa last a little longer, I add some of the already made HOT salsa from the store.

 

Note: This is a HOT salsa!  Just a warning.

Serve with chips as an appetizer and pour over chicken for dinner.  Very easy, because even I can do it!

 

Happy Eating!

Laura

Back Tracking

So the snow is FINALLY melting! YAAAAA HHOOOOOO!!!!  Thursday, Mom and I finally got out of the house and ran some errands, but the snow and ice were still everywhere!  The county office called off school for the kids on Friday, but teachers had a choice of having a teacher work day Friday or Monday.  So, I went to work in my room Friday.  We were allowed to leave a little early, but because I am a work-a-holic I stayed till about 4:00!  I just don’t know how everybody gets it done without working after school or on the weekends.  I know that I will be better when I have taught the same grade for more than one year, but right now I am working extra! *I’ll take any suggestions on how to get the working under control lol!

Moving on to a Wedding Weekend update…

After choosing my wedding dress the next big thing that I want to pick out was a bridesmaids’ dress.  This dress also had to meet a LOT of criteria.  I have been a bridesmaid in several weddings and have worn a wide range of dresses…

 

 

               

    

   

I feel like I am leaving somebody out but, there is one in June… I can’t get it to post, but it is platinum and a v-neck.  I am looking forward to that one.  It will be my first time as a Maid of Honor!  I have been lucky to not have to wear anything hideous!  My friends have good taste!

I didn’t think my turn to pick out a bridesmaids dress would EVER come, but since it has I wanted to pick something that everyone would like.  Now if you poll 12 girls they are not going to all like anything, unless it’s a hot guy.  The criteria for the BM dress was similar to the wedding dress:

NO STRAPLESS… again with the unified look, the constant pulling, etc.

No back out.. again I think this is a wedding, not the club.

Cost…there is no sense in spending 300 on a dress… we are not millionaires… yes they are beautiful, but ridiculous.

and the standard

“Something that looks good on everybody and something they could wear again”… Just a side note… I've never worn any of mine again, expect the black dress in the last picture… because it is just a black dress.

The real motivation is that I wanted the dress to photograph well :) So I will leave you with the choices I went through before choosing “The One”

Courtesy of Jim Hjelm

   

  

courtesy of Avlina Valenta   ------->

 

 

Courtesy of Jasmine Bridal

So with all of those choices… I picked…. NONE!  I didn’t want long because it is going to be hot has BLUE BLAZES! ( I know this people quit reminding me!) So with lots of encouragement from Whitney, and the girls and Cherry Tree Lane I chose…duh dada dahhhh…

Adorable right? Choosing the color is a whole other blog post so to make an extremely long story short… we are going with PETAL!   I. Love. It.  I hope that the girls love it too.

Keep checking back next week for lots of inspiration for your home and your classroom.  On the next edition of Wedding Weekend I will be featuring the CAKE!

 

 

 

Have a Blessed…. hopefully SNOW-FREE… Week                      Love, Laura