Update

Well it certainly has been a while. Let's do a life update first. Joel and I celebrated our 1 year anniversary with a FABULOUS weekend at Belamere Suites. :) We had a fantastic time and were able to re-connect, of which we have been in desperate need! It gave me the idea that we should have a date-night every month. Hopefully that is not being too selfish, but we have a hard time finding adult time and end up bickering at each other all the time...which is uber bad. :( So, in the long run, though we will be without the baby once a month...it will be best for everyone. :) I hope. Ella turns 8 months tomorrow!! My goodness...where has the time gone?? As of Friday, I am down 21.4 pounds since January 2nd. Not as much as I would like to be down, but definitely progress!! More workouts, less chocolate. ugh. :(

School has been very interesting as well. One of my amazing adventurous kiddos has decided to be a runner. Wonderful. Good thing I am asking for more workouts. LOL. Speaking of that, we will be starting the kiddo work-out tapes I bought this week...woo!!! I am excited :). Lots of fun stuff going on this week...Leap Day, Dr. Suess Birthday, and one of my aide's birthdays. Too many activities and not enough time!!

So, I have noticed many kiddos not focusing very well during Calendar time anymore. I understand a bit...its the same everyday so the routine gets dull. I am not ready to take anything out or add anything in so I have decided to make a journal page...something to help them stay focused and keep them involved in every step. Since I got the inspiration from others, I figured it would only be nice if I shared it with you for FREE. :) You can find it here.

Alright, time to be a bit more productive....Maybe with another workout. :D

Calendar Freebie!

So, after starting to follow lots of Education blogs and seeing all the creativity on pinterest, I decided to do a little creating of my own! :) It is not much, but I am pretty excited about the way it turned out. First, let me give you some back story...

I am constantly adding things to my morning/calendar routine. I am doing so much now that I am often forgetting some of it. Every day I have to ask my kiddos..."Did I forget anything??" They are usually pretty good, but a couple of things that I added before break...have been forgotten all week. OOPS!! So, I decided I needed to make myself some "Calendar Cards" to help me remember my calendar schedule. Oh my, I feel sorry for my 60 year old brain if I am already forgetting so much at 24. I guess I better start eating more healthy fats and antioxidants--yes, I did just google what foods help your memory (Walnuts, Eggs, Carrots, Spinach, Broccoli, Salmon, in case you were wondering.)

Anyway, download your freebie here.

Ok, enough of that...off to bed!! Night All!!

Winter Break Updates!

How is it already Friday?! Seriously? I have to go back to work on Tuesday?! Ugh. I am missing my kiddos, but it sure is nice to be home with the hubby and the baby!

Just thought I would stop in to give an update. I have been playing around with my Blog a lot lately, updating backgrounds, layouts, fonts, etc. I just can't seem to find something that I can fall in love with. Other than that, I have been spending time with the family and looking for after-Christmas deals online. Hubby said that we could get a new Christmas Tree if I could find a good deal so that is my latest mission!! I also purchased a Chest to keep at the end of our bed...I have been wanting one for a while and finally found one on Target: Camden Storage Trunk It is on clearance right now for $52.48, but I had a day-after-Christmas coupon that took off $10.00. I also used my Target card so I got another 5% off and free shipping...straight to my house. I think that might be the best deal I've gotten all year! SCORE!!!

Ok...now school stuff. Last time I posted, we were working on finishing up our Handprint Calendars for our parent gifts...and let me just say, they turned out AWESOME. I borrowed one of my student's calendars so I could take pictures to share with you all.

It was a LOT of work, but they turned out great!! Halfway through I thought "oh, I should have made one for myself..I could have used some of all of the kiddos handprints." Maybe we will work on that for next year. :)


This certainly is the season of giving. To help remind my students of that, I decided that we were going to make something for all of the "behind-the-scenes" people in their lives. We made cookies for the office staff and the cafeteria staff. For special individuals (bus drivers, custodians, therapists, etc.), we made chocolate covered candy canes. The recipe I had called for peppermint sticks, but I couldn't find any of those. They probably would have been easier because the candy canes were hard to open without breaking. My aides ended up doing most of the candy cane un-wrapping. LOL. But, they turned out pretty good. They didn't look all that hot, but they sure tasted good!



Well, the ball just dropped in New York, so Happy New Year Everyone! Hope 2012 brings you much happiness!!

Changing Things UP!

Well, it has been over a year since I have posted. What a busy and eventful year it has been too!!

I am now in my second year of teaching as a Special Education Teacher. I absolutely love my job and my students. Of course it is a challenge, but it is one that I enjoy very much. :)

I am also now a newlywed and a new mommy. Yep...told you it has been eventful. Here is a picture of my beautiful family:

I am trying to start my blog back up in hopes that it will give me a way to remember my more creative ideas (if I ever have any...).

Speaking of creative ideas, I have fallen in love....with a website. If you are a blogger, teacher, crafter, or just an web-surfer....you need to know about the website Pinterest. I have gotten so many ideas from this website it is ridiculous.

...Like this one: I used a garment rack I bought at Target for $10 as a chart stand! Yes...a $10 chart stand! Only teachers will be as excited about this as I was. Chart Stands are EXPENSIVE. I got so excited about the idea when I saw it that I immediately started shopping online for a garment rack. But, I couldn't find the exact one I wanted so I convinced my wonderful hubby to go shopping with me the next day...AND I FOUND IT!!! When I saw it in the store, I literally almost yelled with glee. So, I got it back to my classroom and put my pocket chart on it. It was perfect. :) When I showed it to my supervisor she was like "oh my goodness...a divider!!" I hadn't even thought of that idea!! Anyway, this idea has multiple uses and I absolutely love it.




Here's another idea I got from pinterest...Ordinal Words!! I have one student who has a goal to work on directional words (first, up, behind, etc.). One of the activities I use for this is a worksheet out of our curriculum where she has to "color the third bird, draw a circle around the first tree" etc. She has SUCH a hard time with it. After introducing this list, she has done sooo much better! She now know that "first" is the 1, "third" is 3...etc. And...it just looks beautiful. :) You can download the cards here....

Ordinal Word Cards

Thank you Doodle Bug Teaching!!! :D



Have you ever heard of Borax? Ever used it? How about for making snowflakes? I have! I did this with my students a few weeks ago. It was a bit over their head and I should have tried it before doing it with my class, but the snowflakes turned out great! :) If I did it again with the kiddos, it would be easier for me to explain what we were doing and have them help, but the first time was just too crazy. Maybe we will try again next year. For now, I will just enjoy my beautiful tree and beautiful snowflakes.





The other snowflakes you see on my tree are bubble paint. You put paint and dish soap together in a container and use a straw to blow bubbles. Then, you dip the paper into the bubbles to make a cool design. We have done this twice now. The first time we did it with fall leaves. The students really enjoy this, however, I suggest not letting them do the bubble-blowing. I was just too worried about them forgetting to blow rather than suck and accidentally drinking the paint. YIKES! :/


One last thing to mention for today...I have the most wonderful aides. We help balance each other out and just work hard! My amazing and crafty classroom aide designed this beautiful snowman for our door. I originally wanted to do a present like I saw on pinterest, but decided that a snowman would be better because we could leave him up longer. I told her what I wanted and she just went to it...He even has a real scarf!!! He turned out great...check him out:



Thanks for reading! Check back soon for these upcoming posts: Handprint Calendars, Shaving Cream Snowmen, Salt Dough Ornaments, and Peppermint Sticks...lots of projects to finish this week!! Wishing you a very happy holiday season! :)

Time for a life update!

So, I thought I would be able to come home after work and type up all the things that had happened during the day. However, almost 4 weeks later, this is only my second blog. Don't be so disappointed, sunshine...I've been busy!

My 4th day on the job, my teacher assistant quit. I hadn't really learned all of the paperwork yet and I was left to fend for myself. SWEET. I have been working really hard to learn everything while still trying to balance keeping my kiddos motivated and entertained. I thought I was doing pretty good, until Rule Change came about. I have a new list of rules that the "powers that may be" have decided needed to be put into place in my classroom. Long story short, I'm very frustrated. So, my kiddos see this as more things they are taking away and I can't say anything, but I almost agree with them. I've lost all chance of motivating these kids to do their work. We had a great system set up -- 4 days of work, 1 fun day, but apparently we can't do that anymore. So what's the point? They have taken away all motivation the kids did have to actually work. I am so FRUSTRATED.

I haven't updated this on here yet, but my position at this facility is a full-year position. If I can just make it through the next 3 weeks....I'm halfway there!

I had an interview on Tuesday with Athens-Meigs ESC. They called me on Friday as I was on my way to sign my job contract with North Point. I signed anyway. The interview went really well and I think they may be interested, but I don't think I am. The starting salary is significantly lower. I would be working with more kids and less aids. The ONLY really appealing thing about this job is that it is down here close to Joel. But, when Joel and I talked, he agreed I needed to keep my job at North Point and he would look for a job up there. We're talking about going up sometime to look at houses and such. Hopefully, we can find him a job too.

I think we are telling his parents tonight that we will be moving. I asked him last night what he thinks they might say. All he said was that they will tell him he needs to have a job before he moves.

I told him about the insurance thing the other night and it brought up a brief discussion about marriage. Previously, he had told me that he wants to get married, just doesn't want to go through the whole elaborate process, but that he knew that wasn't fair to me. I have, however, come to terms with the idea of just going to the courthouse. So, in our conversation the other night I said something to him about just going to the courthouse and he told me that he didn't think his parents would like that very much. It seems like the poor guy is trying to balance what he wants, with what I want, with what everybody else wants. No wonder he isn't jumping the gun to get hitched.

well, time to get back to work. Pray that I don't break anyone's neck today and actually do make it through the next 3 weeks...........

3..2..1....GO!!!

Well, here it is. My very first blog on blogger. I had been using Myspace to blog for a while, but I haven't logged onto Myspace in a very VERY long time.

Anyway, this is the start of my life as an "adult." I'm not a college student anymore -- I officially got my diploma in the mail 2 days ago. Perfect time to start a new page....even if its an electronic one. ;)

Funny to think that I got my Michigan Teaching Certification before I could get my Diploma. Way to go Eastern. You never cease to amaze me. Hope you spelled my name right, but I doubt it.

So, back to my life as an "adult." Seems kinda crazy that I won't be a student anymore. It's the only thing I have known for the past 17 years of my life. BUT, alas...I will learn to get paid rather than having to pay. :)

I started a summer job on Friday. I am working as an Educational Assistant at a Residential Treatment Facility. The clients there all have drug and/or alcohol addictions, so I certainly am learning a lot already! I am thinking that I will be using this blog a lot to document situations and use it to reflect.



So, let's talk about Friday. Let me give you a basic overview of our schedule--

8-9: Get ready for Morning Report
9-10: Morning Report and Lesson planning
10-11:30: Teach morning class (Boys)
11:30-12:30: Lesson Planning and Lunch
12:30-1:30: Teach Group (Life Skills)
1:30-3: Teach afternoon class (Girls)
3-4: Wrap up for the day, Lesson Planning, etc.

So, Morning Report is interesting, especially getting it ready. It really has nothing to do with the classroom, which is why I find it interesting why the teacher ends up preparing it, but whatever. On Friday, for the morning class, the teacher didn't have anything prepared. So, I offered a few suggestions and so to "break me in" he handed me the papers we printed and told me I would teach...my first day. sweet. So, I did and the lesson went fairly well. :) He led Group and the kids seemed very uninterested. The afternoon class had been reading a play so we continued with that and then the day was almost over. He showed me some more paperwork stuff (all stuff which has probably gone way over my head -- despite the fact that I carried my notebook and pen with me the whole day). All in all it was a good day, but I certainly have a lot to learn!! There is a whole LOT of paperwork to learn -- and a whole lot of people. They keep talking about trainings I will have to do and such -- seems like a lot for a person who will only be there at MOST 6 weeks. Maybe I should have a talk with Patsy on Tuesday to see if it is just a summer position or not.


I'm pretty set that I am going to be teaching at Woodmore in the Fall. I haven't heard anything back from Athens-Meigs ESC and I am not going to sign my North Point contract and then turn around and interview for another job. Joel and I need to have a talk about all of this. He seemed pretty ready to go when I first got the job offer, but every time I bring it up lately, he just seems so wishy-washy (for lack of a better word). I say something like "we won't be living here much longer..." and he says "welllll, you don't know how long we will be here." Doesn't sound to good does it? Leave your comments and let me know what you think.....or any advice you have for me.