Did you enter?

It's the last day to enter Tori's 5 days of giveaways.Today's gift is...  Jessica at Mrs. Stanford's class is also having a giveaway - connected to Donor's Choose.  Go check her out too! 
Amanda at Teaching Maddeness is having a week long giveaway.  She posted yesterday about Brag Tags, but she has other prizes as well  including today's talk bar from Learning Resources.
Tonya is giving away her Monthly Writing Prompts to a lucky reader.  All you have to do is comment and she will pick someone on Saturday.  
Updated:  I found another week long giveaway going on with Charity at the OCB.  Today she's teaming up with: and tomorrow will be with ...and yes, by blogging about it, I sometimes get another chance at the prize. :)  
Hope you are having a wonderful day!

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Day after Thanksgiving!

Thanksgiving was a success.  Family time, thankful time, eating time... it was all good.  I was in a little food coma when we headed home at 6 pm... had to head home to let the dog out or else a little nap would have been perfect.  Then the fun of online shopping really started.  Picked up some good deals at JcPenny, Target, and Amazon.  Not as many as last year, but that's okay - I don't need to spend a lot to still have that satisfaction of getting a good deal.  I think we are basically done with shopping.  That's a good thing, right?  
Now it's today, and I just feel old.  Friends went out last night and were up all night hitting the stores, and instead I got my beauty sleep.  I can barely make it past midnight most nights... oh well!  Every year I say that I will go out, and then I don't.  I think that perhaps I need to face reality that I'm not an all-nighter type of girl.
The tradition of Black Friday in our house is a PJ day and pulling out the Christmas decorations.  The Christmas music will go on in a bit, and somehow everything will be transformed into Christmas.  I've already moved a toy collection thing upstairs to one of the boys' rooms to make room for where the Christmas tree will be placed.  
Over this vacation I've also been spending a bit of time on Pinterest.  Here are some of my favorite Christmas pins on my Christmas board and my Winter board.  Then I have a Gift board that might help you as well.  
At this moment in time, I'm considering having my students either do this activity    

Click to take you to Pinterest

or

I had my class make the trivets for Mother's Day last year.  They were nice and inexpensive (16 cents each).  If you click the trivet picture it will take you to my home blog where I walked through the steps.  
Happy Friday!    

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Every-Day Edits

Today I cleaned.  The house is clean.  The boys are relatively clean.  The clothes and dishes are clean.  Hopefully everything will stay in its place until after we see the rest of the family tomorrow.  :)  
As I'm sitting down completely exhausted from cleaning, I've been thinking about the things that I love using in my classroom.  You know, the things that I'm grateful for...  I decided to try and organize my files a bit more on the computer and I ran across my folder of Every-Day Edits.  
Do you use these too?  

The stack I use comes from Education World.  They have made it so easy for me to find everything on there.  The students need that extra practice in editing.... don't we all?  They provide a non-fiction paragraph to edit, and it's sorted by real dates in history.  I call it our treasure hunt time when we tackle it together in class on Mondays.  If we don't do it in class, the paragraph goes home for homework.  It's that important to me for them to do it.  Since they have 2 per page, I can easily justify the amount of copies.  
Education World has a ton of other stuff as well, but that's all I really wanted to share for today.  It's a free resource that I am grateful for.  Click the link above to head on over so you can check it out yourselves.  This resource is more for the intermediate grades, but they also have something similar for primary students.
Happy Thanksgiving! 

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Blogging Thankfulness

Can you tell that I love November?  I also love all the thankfulness that is going around. :)

Today, I am linking up with Stephanie over at Teaching in Room 6 to share what I'm thankful for in Blogland. (Yes, it's a place similar to Disneyland but without the lines and overpriced food.)  

There is so much to share!  

It was last year that I really started noticing all the teaching blogs out in Blogland.  I found Charity's The Organized Classroom Blog over on Facebook and realized that there were many many teaching resources out there... and that got me going.  I started googling resources (since the stack of teaching books in my cupboards actually meant that I would have to go through a ton of teaching books in my cupboards) and that led me to find Kristen at Ladybug's Teacher Files.  Since moving back to 4th grade (after 4 years in primary), I felt the need to locate supplemental resources.  I pinned basically everything I could from her just so I could remember.

Then I found Stephanie at Teaching in Room 6 - another huge help with moving to the intermediate grades.  She had so many ideas and resources that were easy for me to implement.  I started checking other 4th grade blogs of Fabulous 4th Grade Froggies, Fancy Free in Fourth, 4th Grade Frolics, and Oh Boy 4th Grade on a daily basis, and everyday I found more blogs that I had to add to my bookmarks.  Learning more and more, I was sharing more and more, and my dear friend and coworker told me that I really should start my own blog.

So I did when summer started, and in the process of time I have kept growing in my learning.  The linky parties let me run into more and more super smart teachers out there.  I realized this past summer about that fun feature that allows you to "follow" blogs. :)  So my list in my bookmarks bar turned into a list of teachers that have become my colleagues, my role models.  Thank you for teaching me.  Thank you for all the resources.  Thank you for all the professional development that really should be counted toward something... 

Thank you for helping me learn the ins and outs of being a blogger.  Thank you for putting up with me.  Thank you for the encouraging words.  Thank you for answering my questions, and talking to me on FB.  Thank you for making this journey fun and exciting.

Happy Thanksgiving!   

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Christmas Bookmarks (Freebie)

Here is a freebie for you!  During this week of vacation I am creating a little gift for my students for Christmas.  I ordered a class set of books from Scholastic during that huge bonus point sale at the beginning of the year.  They are all getting the book My Life as a Book.
I wanted to make them a new bookmark since they are still using the ones that I gave them on the first day of school.

With these bookmarks I am laminating/hole punching them and using yarn on top to attach one of these cute little ornaments.

  

The tiny ornaments are from Target's Dollar Spot (16 per pack).  I will also give them a packet of hot chocolate mix and then will stick everything into a brown paper bag.  

Click the bookmark picture to take you to Google Docs.

Click above to take you to the other freebies over at Classroom Freebies!
Hope this helps someone!

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3,2,1 - Week #2

Well I did it!  

Last week I had 3 goals - one personal, one home, one school, and I tackled them all!

I was able to get the paperwork off my desk before vacation started, I was more on top of meal planning, and I made time to take care of me (which meant that new batteries are now in my food scale and on the stationary bike).  I did take the dog for a walk on the days that it was possible, but the days it wasn't I got on the bike.

I had all these fun Thanksgiving activities planned and we did complete almost all of them.  It's exhausting adding so much to an already packed schedule - but I think it's important to have fun in the classroom too.

The thing I wanted to try this past week was using the now!board with my mission booklets.  That didn't work out the way that I had planned.  My projector decided to stop working during a lesson and it threw me for a loop - no now!board, no ladibug...  I told the kids that sometimes we just can't rely on technology so much.  So, we did things the "old fashioned" way - using the whiteboard and markers. :)

So, here's my new list for this coming week...

3 goals

*School goal - I'm on vacation!!!  My goal this week will be to make sure to get all my planning for the "extra" December fun ready to be prepped.

*Home goal - I really want to tackle the cupboards, closets, and toys this week.  We went through the boys closets last weekend, but there are more things to clean out and donate before Christmas.  

*Personal goal - This week I'm just hoping to make good choices with all my favorite Thanksgiving foods.  I love me some turkey and sweet potatoes... hoping that my brain will be thinking as much as my stomach wants to.

2 things I'm looking forward to

*I'm looking forward to family time.  I'm looking forward to having fun with my little boys and getting a chance to make some memories.  9 days of playing and reading and play dough and movie nights and building forts and painting and baking (need to remember to not bake...).

 *The day after Thanksgiving we ALWAYS start decorating for Christmas.  I'm so excited about getting all the decorations out.

1 thing I want to try 

I want to try making this for Thanksgiving morning.  It's the Pumpkin French Toast Bake from Minimalist Baker.  Of course I saw the picture on Pinterest.  Now I just have to brave the store to go get all the ingredients.   

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Stuffed Linky Party

I'm linking up with Lyndsey over at A Year of Many Firsts 

to share  what I'm thankful for.  

   

I am thankful for my husband.  I know I've shared it before, but he really is the rock in the family.  He remains calm when the chaos of raising 3 boys and teaching full time becomes overwhelming.  

 I am thankful for my oldest son.  I can't believe he is already 8 1/2 years old.  He just grew out of his "new" shoes in the past 2 months.  I'm having issues with him getting older.

 I am thankful for my middle son.  I can give him credit for the majority of gray hair on my head.  The past 6 years have been a blessing.  He is so independent!   

I am thankful for my little guy.  He is about to turn 3, and the time has flown since he was born.

I am thankful for my class, coworkers, and school community.  I am thankful for the roof over my head and the food on the table.  I am thankful for technology and the ability to learn from so many other teachers out there in Blogland.  I am thankful for good friends and laughter.  I know I can complain with the best of them (I'm working on it), but I'm thankful for the life God has given me.  I am blessed!      

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