March Made-It! St. Patrick's Day edition :)

Okay so I can't believe that it's been a couple of months since I was on.  February was VERY hectic for me.  I had my niece's FROZEN birthday which was crazy trying to get ready for (I help with planning and making decorations, and the cake and everything).  Then I had conferences.  Not to mention how it's the shortest month and you have 100th Day and Valentine's Day and Presidents, Black History, and Dental Health Month.  I would have had a TON of made its to share!  Maybe I'll remember and share this week anyway.  lol  I don't know what happened with the rest of January that I didn't post and this month it has been all about assessing and report cards.  Well report cards went home Friday.  So that leaves me with time to actually post Made-Its!  I was reminded that Made It Monday was this week because of good old Facebook.  I forget that it's the 2nd Monday and not the first.  So this weekend was all about getting things ready for St. Patrick's Day for my kiddos.  Now I don't have a lot of pics of these things yet because I'm going to take pics when they are set up in the classroom.
Made-it 1:
I too, made those fabulous, "I'm so Lucky to have you in my class" goodie bags for my students with the lucky charms.  Loved the freebie from A Cupcake for the Teacher as well.

This is her pic.  I thought I'd use it so you could see my other Made-it as well.

Made-It 2:
I also made the "You're the pot of gold at the end of my rainbow" with oreos baggie for my kiddos too.
I'm putting these in my Halloween black cauldron that will magically turn into a pot of "gold" for St. Patty's Day.  This will go along with…
Made-It 3:
Also from the fabulous Cupcake for the Teacher (she's fabulous isn't she??).  We will be doing her classroom Rainbow Treasure Hunt where they will find those fabulous oreo pots of gold.  So those are printed, cut, and ready to go.
Made-It 4:
A Leprechaun will be leaving the kiddos green coins on their desk with this little note:

The coins I've had for a while.  I think I got them from Party City one year.  I had exactly enough left over so I guess I was lucky!!  So these are cut out ready to go and I'm going to put the green coin right in the middle of the clover.  I honestly don't remember where I found this.  I googled "leprechaun note for kids" and found it, so if it belongs to you let me know and I'll link to it!  

Made-It 5:

I also made stickers for my kids to wear because I like them to have something green on in case they don't wear any to school.  I couldn't find any that were a good size or that I liked in the stores so I just made some using this DJ Inkers clipart and 2 x 4 in. labels. 

Made-It 6:

My final Made-it is for my co-workers.  I follow http://www.howdoesshe.com/.  If you subscribe to the blog you get certain Members Only Freebies.  Well this month's freebies were for "St. Patrick's Day in a Jar" labels.  They had different ideas of filling the jar with rainbow candy or colorful flowers or mini rainbow cupcakes.  I thought of this:

So it's just Smart Pop Kettle corn that I popped and then melted a package of green Candy melts, poured it over the popcorn and mixed it up to coat it.  Then I sprinkled on rainbow colored M&Ms and let it set.  I bought mason jars and some green fabric (already had the ribbon) and printed the labels.  I thought this was definitely St. Paddy's Day in a Jar, green and rainbow.  So my team will be getting this as well.  

Oh!  Made-It 7!!

While I was uploading these I remembered one more Made-It!

Flat Stanley!!!  I had to re-make him again this year because apparently my other one has gone off traveling some where and couldn't be found.  We have Spring Break NEXT week so I had to get him ready so I could show my kiddos what to do with him over spring break.  So he's copied, colored, and laminated again for this year.  

So as you can see it was a very busy Sunday for me.  All this plus laundry (did grading Saturday).  

So I will try VERY hard after school to post the pictures of St. Patrick's Day in the classroom with all of the goodies.  

Have a great day and woohoo for me for getting a blog post done!!!!  

:)

Monday Made-it and Elfie!!

So I SHOULD be going to sleep right now because 6AM is going to come really soon and I'm not going to want to get up, but I'm blogging now anyway, because Monday Made-It, MAKES me blog at least once a month.  So I'm doing it!!!

So we'll start off with my Made-Its.  Again I don't have anything really for my classroom.  I kind of do with my Elf on the Shelf, so you'll see that a little later.  I'll show you the other Made-its I have though.
So for Thanksgiving, my sister, niece, and I made these cute little turkey napkin rings for everyone.

Do you see my niece photo bombing at the top of the photo!  Too funny!  

Then I wanted a winter wreath to replace the fall one I have in my classroom that I made last year so I made this yarn one.  

I got everything at Michaels.  That snowflake came in a pack of 6 for $1.99!!

Then I have my Christmas decorations up so I'm including that as a Made-It cause I made it happen!  lol  

My Department 56 North Pole/Elf Land village.  

My Christmas tree.  I used to work at Hallmark so I love ornaments!

Now on to my Elf, which is also kind of a Made-It.  So just like last year, Elfie came to visit this new class.  My elf writes my class letters to let them know he's keeping tabs on them and to give them encouragement for making good choices.  He doesn't do anything really silly because I don't want my kids to do anything silly or get worked up by the silly things he does.  So here are some pics of Elfie this past week:

He's back!  

Elfie decorated the room again with snowflakes and Christmas lights isn't that nice?  He stayed until 5PM on a half-day to get it done too!  ;)  

Day 2 he was next to my globe again.  I forgot to take a picture, but I have one from last year that you can look at if you want to see.  Just click on the Elf label on the side.  :)  

Day 3.  Hanging out above the cubbies.  Bribing the students to be good, and boy did it work!  16 kiddos moved up on the behavior chart after this note!

So the next day,

Thursday, little prize for some kiddos (bell garland, cut, pack of 16 bells $1 store)

Let me tell you everyone was really good after that too because they were hoping to get one the following day, no luck though.

And this is where Elfie was hiding on Thursday.  Hanging out with my snowman and leaving a note on how proud he was and how he told Santa about how awesome the class was.  

Friday I had Elfie on top of my Smartboard projector.  Again, forgot to take a pic, but again he was there last year so you can see a pic in the Elf section.  

The students will find him today by the clock and he is leaving another treat and note for students who moved up on the chart.  Really does seem to help and is fun!  

So those are my made-its and Elf scoop.  It has been one busy weekend!  Friday night was out til after 10PM for our annual girls family shopping night (first Friday in December) and got some more shopping done (still have more to do).  Saturday I watched my niece and we baked cookies for a cookie exchange we then went to and then I went to my parents for my weekly dinner and stayed until after 10PM watching Elf and helping them put up their Christmas decorations.  Then Sunday was our annual girls family cookie baking event, where we each pick 2 Christmas cookie recipes to bake and we get together at 1 house, help each other bake them and split them up for each other.  Here's what that looked like:

Everyone's containers lined up and filled.  

A close up of mine.  

Super fun, but busy, busy, busy.  Now I need to go to sleep.  Luckily we can wear jeans all this week if we pay $1 each day for charity, so I can get up and go more easily tomorrow.  

Happy Monday!!  

:)

November Currently and Monthly Made-it!

It's November!  How crazy!  October was hectic, as usual!  We'll see how this month goes!
I'm starting off this post with Farley's Currently for November:

Not much to explain for Listening.  I always do these once I'm in bed for the night so it's pretty quiet around here.  

I love my family so much and we are a very close bunch.  I'm one of 5 kids and my 4 siblings all have families and we live around each other and get together all of the time.  I'm very lucky.  So today I went to the circus with my eldest sister and her family and my younger sister and her daughter.  Fun time.  Let me share one of the pics I took:

So fun!

Thinking - So I follow Hip2Save on fb.  If you don't know about it, it's this great "couponing" site.  So the gal who runs it posted about this great Little People toy that amazon had on sale for $22.99.  Then a reader tip was that Target would price match and you could use the $10 off coupon that Hip2Save had posted a few days earlier.  So I went to Target and got a regularly $39.99 toy for $14 with my Red Card!  Woohoo!  I was very excited.  One present down for the holidays.  Couldn't pass up a deal like that!  Then I put away all of my Halloween decorations, printed out a whole bunch of center games for math, and went to my parents.  Then today was the circus, cutting and laminating all of the center games, grading papers, and updating my classroom website.  I got it all done!  Another big Woohoo!  And now I'm blogging!  

Wanting is pretty self-explanatory.  I have a great group but sometimes we can be a little chatty and not pay attention.  

Needing is also pretty self-explanatory.  I'm very happy with what I got done this weekend, but I never feel that accomplished during the week.  I would love to have 1 day every week where we didn't have students and I could get everything done then.  I would take longer school days so I could have that 1 day where I could get stuff done at school without running around like a crazy person.  

No onto the yummy pin.  I pin yummy things all of the time.  I have a dessert board, a cookies board, and holiday boards with yummy things.  This pin is one of the newest so I thought I would put it in:

Peanut Butter Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough Brownie

I mean come on, does that not sound soooo good!  There is nothing in that title that I do not love so I had to pin it!!  

Okay so that is my Currently.  Now onto my Monthly Made-Its!  

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So first things first, I pinned this really cute pumpkin sign from The Polka Dot Pavillion that I loved, but did not want to spend $50, so I thought I'll just make it.  So I headed over to Michaels to pick up a wooden pumpkin.  No go.  I found one I liked online, but it was a set of 6, so I said okay, I'll make them for my family too and give it to them at our yearly Trick-or-Treat party.  I had 1 extra left over so I made it for my friend Krista.  Hers is below.  

Now I just made the pumpkin.  She added it to her basket she keeps on her door.  All I did was get 11in. wooden pumpkin cut outs (6 for $19.50), painted them, used my Cameo and vinyl for the lettering, and some tulle for around the stem.  I texted everyone and told them they couldn't ask me why, but polka dots or chevron.  2 picked polka dots the rest were chevron. Painted it orange first and then added the yellow polka dots or chevron stripes.  I was very happy with how it turned out.  On mine I just put Happy Fall Y'all.  Krista jokingly told me she needs one now for every season.  lol  

To go along with the pumpkins, I made these cards:

I followed this video and used my cameo.  Very happy with how it turned out!  I also gave them to my teammates with a purple jar of candy that I cut out Trick-or-Treat in vinyl and added to it (forgot to take a picture of that).

On Friday, October 25 is when my school had their Halloween celebration.  The neighborhood does Trick-or-Treating on Sunday so starting last year we do it the Friday before.  Really love doing that.  This year my teammates and I dressed up as scarecrows.  

It was great because this cost me no money!  My teammate bought the raffia that we used as our straw (I used blue painters tape to tape it on the inside of my clothes and it was not itchy) and I had everything else, just turned it into a scarecrow costume.  Super fun and my kiddos loved it!  The pic above was taken at my parents house for the Trick-or-Treat party.  

Well that same night (Friday the 25th) I had Jodie and Brynn come over to my house for a Halloween themed dinner.  I made mummy dogs (but with sausage because oddly enough my niece doesn't like hot dogs), smiley face fries (thought it was like masks) and Halloween mac and cheese.  I also made witches brew drinks with lime sherbet, ginger ale, and lime concentrate with gummy worms as garnish. My sis got the pics of all of that.  I finished it off by making these stackable surprise cookies:

You just get the tube of sugar cookie dough, slice them into round cookies, bake them and then put one cookie down as your base, for the next cookie, cut a circle out of the middle, put it down, do the same to another cookie, and add a full cookie on top.  Before I put the cookie on top I filled it with Reese's Pieces.  Frosting is the glue holding all of the layers together.  Yummy!  

For my family's party on Sunday I made these:

They were green velvet cupcakes that I made to look like witches by using the cookies that have the hole in the middle and chocolate bottoms.  I just flipped it so the chocolate was on top and added a caramel kiss to the top.  Melted it a bit to stick to the cookie, added frosting and presto.  I thought green would be a nice touch to make them witchy with orange hair.  lol  Big hit.  :)

So those are all of my Made-its I did in October.  Can't wait to get some things done this month too!  

Monthly Monday Made-It September

So I'm joining in with 4th Grade Frolics to show what I've been up to since the last Made It.

I've actually been pretty good with blogging lately so you can see what I've been up to in my previous posts and see some classroom pics.

So I finally did what I have seen floating around the web and what I pinned from pinterest last year and did the above.  I know.  My "h" in lunch fell off.  Of course I did not notice that while I was taking the picture.  lol  I could not find it either, so I have to make a new one.  Did I remember to do that this weekend?  No.  So we still have Lunc.  lol  I used $1 clocks I got from the Target Dollar Spot last summer I believe and my adhesive vinyl and cameo.  I'm happy with it and it beats the kiddos asking every 5 minutes if it's time.  It is definitely helping with that, although they still ask for recess.  I didn't have a clock for recess and since we only have it 2 days a week, that's the clock I didn't do.  

You can see more things I did here and here.  I also finished up the Grammar Game activity pack that I have been working on to go with Unit 2 of my reading series.  

As you can see it just works on grammar skills and it doesn't HAVE to go with a particular reading series.  It doesn't go with any of the stories or anything.  I just did a grammar pack of games that go with the skills we learn in that unit.  I thought it would be a handy thing to have for review and for Word Work for Daily 5.  It has 5 activities in it: a noun sort, noun scoot, plural noun match, proper noun scoot, and possessive nouns silly sentences.  I am very happy that I got it done.  You can go to it on my tpt page by clicking on the pic above.  Unit 1 I finished before school started.  You can find that pack by clicking here.  

Well that's it.  As I mentioned in previous posts, it's been busy but we're starting to settle in.  This weekend it was nice because I didn't have to go anywhere and the piles of papers to grade haven't started yet.  Monday starts Day 13 for us and my students will start spelling tests and homework packets so the grading will begin!  lol  I hope it's going well for everyone else as well and I hope you'll take the time to check out my other posts (they only have a sad 4 views).  Have a great day everyone!  

Monday Made-It and IN Disney!! :)

So when you are reading this I will actually be on my Disney World vacation.  With planning this trip for about a year and a half, it's hard to believe it's actually here!  I love all of the planning of the trip and the anticipation of the trip and then it gets to a few days before the trip and anxiety soars sky high as I make sure everything it packed, I have all of our tickets and things, and my suitcase isn't too heavy!  We're gone for 8 days so that's a lot to pack!  Hopefully it will be smooth sailing while we're there and coming back!
Now onto Monday Made-It with Tara!

So let's start with my final Disney Movie and a Meal.  We watched Pinocchio for the final movie as the girls hadn't seen it and it's been a LONG time since Jodie and I had.  

It was super hard finding any craft ideas to do for this one, so Jodie and I had to wing it.  I must say I think what we did was super fun!
The first activity we did was Pin the Nose on Pinocchio (Jodie's idea).  So I just printed out a Pinocchio picture and then through a photo software I have I was able to copy just the NOSE of that picture so I could make multiples for the girls to use.  It worked out perfectly.  They each got 4 chances to get it right and they had so much fun!

See a couple were pretty close!

Then it was time to eat and watch the movie.  We went with an italian theme so Jodie and I had Paninis and the girls had Spaghettios.  Jodie also made some cheesy baked tomatoes.  

It was very yummy.  Sadly after eating the movie didn't hold any of their attention at all.  I was pretty much the only one watching it.  Jodie said she couldn't blame them as it isn't her favorite either.  

For dessert I used a recipe that was for Lady and the Tramp.  It was cupcakes that looked like spaghetti and meatballs, but I figured it would still go with our Italian theme.  

For the final activity we did paper bag Pinocchio hand puppets.  I had printed out his hat and they used one of the noses from the game.  They thought the puppets were very fun too and after making them went off to play with them.  We called them back to watch the last 5-7 minutes of the movie.  

So that was our final Disney movie.  It was a fun way to countdown to the trip and also a fun thing to do this summer.  Almost like having a little Disney summer fun program twice a week.  I'm happy we did it!  :)

Now onto my school Made-Its.  

For my first one I took a cheap clipboard and modge-podged it with scrapbooking paper and then added ribbon.  I'm going to hang it by the door and use it for the awesome Bathroom Tally sheet from Fluttering Through First Grade (which I found on pinterest).  

My room is right next to the bathroom, which I like because it's easier to keep my eye and ear on it, but since it's right there the kids can abuse it.  You know how it is, they want a break from what we're doing, so they HAVE to go to the bathroom.  I'm hoping this will help with that.  I'm excited to try it.  

My next Made-It are the READ letters.  I wanted to make them last year and never got around to it.  When I was at Wal-Mart the other day, there were the letters so I thought, I'm going to do it!  

First I painted the sides with some green paint I had and then I just took scrapbooking paper that I only had 1 sheet of and there you are!  I'm going to put it on my window sill that's in my reading corner.  I was a little nervous to modge-podge everything because I know people have had horror stories with is bubbling and wrinkling, but luckily I had no problem.  

My final Made-It is 4th Grade Frolics awesome Facebook Fan Freebie Understanding Rubric that she posted for a Monday Made-It.  

I LOVED the idea of this and am so thankful to Tara for sharing it with us.  I added my green with brown polka dots ribbon that I used on everything and it's ready to hang up in my room.  

Besides getting ready for Disney, I was also trying to do everything I could to get stuff ready for school since I won't be working on anything while on vacation.  So I have a lot of other things ready to go and be made when I get back.  Now technically us teachers weren't supposed to start setting up our rooms until this week, but since I won't be able to, I snuck in early on Friday.  Jodie, Brynn, and Jaslene came with to help me.  We brought all of my stuff I lugged home for the summer back to get it out of my house.  Then they were a huge help as they helped me take everything down from the tops of my cabinets and put my plastic shelves back together, in place, and with the baskets on it.  Jodie always kindly organizes my desk for me before the start of the year so she did that for me too.  Oh!  Which reminds me!  I also did the little table top steralite drawers to organize the crayons by color.  I forgot to take a picture of that and mention it above.  The girls sorted the crayons for me.  I thought it would be good when the kids' desks have eaten their blue crayon and they need it for something, they can just go get one from the blue crayon drawer instead of digging through my mixed up crayon drawer.  We were only at school for 2 hours but it looked like my classroom again by the time we had left.  Once I come back the only things I'll have to work on now are some bulletin boards, personalization of my new class, and better organization of some things.  If I wouldn't have had their help it would have taken me 2 to 3 times as long.  I'm so thankful!  The other good thing was that because I was the only one there, they weren't other teachers to talk to to distract me!  Usually I spend the first 2 days setting up my classroom gabbing with the other teachers about our summers and I don't get as much done!  

So that's it for this week!  I won't have any Made-Its for next week except Disney memories, but I'll probably post a little about my trip if you're interested.  Have a wonderful week everyone!  :)

More Disney fun and School Monday Made-It!

Well another busy, busy week, but I got a lot done.  Time to check in with 4th Grade Frolic's

So LAST Monday I was determined to get some school stuff done.  I organized my Common Core Resource binder and I finished two school projects and put some more on my to-do list.  

So my first school Made-It is my spin on the "How Are You Going Home Today" organizer.  I teach in a neighborhood school so 90% of my kids either get picked up or walk/ride their bike home.  I also teach in a K-8 building so with that many kids, we have different exits for the kids depending on how they are going home.  1 door is for walkers/car-riders, 1 room is where the little kids go to meet with their big siblings before they head home, one is the main entrance, another is the gym which is where K-4 students that are car riders get picked up from, and then there is the exit for the daycare and bus riders (for our 1 bus).  So my chart lets me know which door the child is going out so in case the office asks, I can tell them.  

I spray-painted some clothespins green that they will use.  I'm deciding on whether I want to use my label maker on the clothespins for their names (that's what I'm leaning towards) or if I want to use their numbers.  

The other Made-It I did was my take on the Homework Club that has been floating on Monday Made-It the last few weeks.  I used Tara's awesome numbers from her free download (Thank you Tara!!).  Now I do not have a problem with students turning in their homework.  Hopefully I won't this year either.  My grade does weekly homework packets, and my students do a great job turning them in.  Sometimes they are a day late, but still they get turned in.  What I have a bigger problem with  getting turned in, are their Monthly Reading Logs.  We have a school wide monthly reading program, The Wolves Reading Club, where the students win, almost like brag tags, for turning them in and they also get coupons to sporting events and restaurants.  I'm lucky if I get 50% of my class to participate and I even put it as part of their homework.  So, I took the Homework Club idea and made a title to go with the monthly reading club.  

Wolves Reading Club, Are YOU in it?  

So happy with how it turned out.  I hope it will motivate my students to do it.  The classes that get 100% participation even get to play the wii on a Smartboard.  That doesn't seem to motivate them, but hopefully this will and at least I'm rewarding the students for doing what they are supposed to do too.  

I was very happy with myself for getting those done.  I also finished the Tinker Bell tanks that my sister, niece, and I will be wearing when we head out to Disney in 13 days.  I did the iron-on transfer and bedazzled it for some pixie sparkle.  

Another check-off on the list.  

Tuesday was Mary Poppins lunch at my sister's house.  This week my sister didn't have either of the other girls during our movie days, so it was just Brynn with us.  

So we had tuna fish finger sandwiches with a salad and then I made some petit fours because we thought that sounded like it would go.  They were yummy.  

We did both activities after eating this time.  The first activity was chalk drawing, to be like Bert in the movie. 

Then we made a paper kite, "Let's go fly a kite, up to the highest height, let's go fly a kite and send it soaring."  

She was very excited to show it off.  lol  

It was around 90 out so then we went in the pool and later, out to dinner.  It was a fun day.  

Wednesday was even hotter with a heat index over 100, but we had already planned on the 3 of us going to Six Flags Great America with my brother and Josie, so we headed out there.  I used my free teacher ticket and my co-teacher gave me hers for Jodie to use.  Because it was so hot, there were not that many people there so we hardly had to wait in any lines.  We kept cool and hydrated and had a fun day.  

Thursday I started working on a new unit for my tpt store, but I haven't finished it yet.  I've been meaning to do it all summer, but hadn't gotten around to it.  It's about half-way done.  At least it's started!

Friday, Jodie and Brynn came over to my house for Peter Pan night.  

We started out with a treasure hunt with a map of my little townhouse area outside for Brynn to follow to find her treasure, Tinker Bell tattoos.  

Pointing to where to go on the map.  

She found it!  

Then we came in and watched the movie and had Pirate ship Pizzas with fruit kabob pirate swords.  

For dessert it was brownies disguised as an island.  

Then the next activity was tracing her shadow.  However, we were having a hard time seeing her shadow, so instead we had her lay down on black paper and traced her and cut it out.  Then my sister took this picture.  It was very cute.  

Saturday, got to do my monthly scrapbooking session with a friend.  I was happy because I was able to start my 2013 album and got through Easter scrapbooked.  My goal at the beginning of summer was to be caught up by Disney, but I don't think that's going to happen.  We'll see.  

Sunday I went out to breakfast with my parents and then Jodie came over to my house.  We did some Disney shopping of snacks and essentials and then we watched Oz the Great and Powerful while we made the last of the Disney hair bows.  

My sister made these.  I had asked for her to make one for me and after she did it, she thought it was so cute that she thought we should each have one.  You can find the tutorial for it here.  

This one was a team effort.  It's 3 layers.  I put each layer together and then she hot glued them together and added the longer ribbon and button.  This ones's for Brynn.  You can find the tutorial for this one here.  

So a lot done last week.  I have my to-do list of things for this week, we'll see if it gets longer!  Have a great day!  :)

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