Oregon Blogger Meet-Up!

Friday was my last day at work and the secretary organized a catered breakfast and silly awards ceremony for the staff. It was so cute. My award, you ask?

haha, this is a perfect fit for me! My co-teacher got the "Pooped" award for always being pooped at the end of her 3-day work week.

Today is my first official day of summer break and what better way to celebrate than go to my very first teacher-blogger meet-up??

 I got to meet with six other wonderful bloggers from Oregon at this beautiful Panera:

As usual, I was a bit late and the last to arrive. This is nothing new, I take forever to get ready!

L-R: Nicole from Teaching with Style, Tanja from Journey of a Substitute Teacher, Michelle from 3rd Grade al Dente, Laura from Teacher Laura, Laurie from Chickadee Jubilee, Sarah from Sarah's First Grade Snippets, and me!

Tanja is SO cute - she brought us all these little gifts she made. 

Making bookmarks out of paint sample strips = genius!

SO funny - this little old man kept coming over to visit with us because he liked our laughter. He came over about 3 times to chat. We told him we were all teachers and he said, "Did they hire you all out of beauty school?" hahaha! Too cute.

Nicole H. (on the right) looks like she's in love! And thanks to Teacher Laura for the covert shot! ha

Five for (the last!) Friday

#1 - Field Trip to the Zoo + a Freebie!

 After 2 months of planning, I finally got to take my class to the Oregon Zoo this week. We had nice weather (thank goodness!) and I was able to get some great shots:

 To make the trip more educational (and to add a bit of friendly competition), I created a fun zoo scavenger hunt for the kids to do on the trip. The kids were really into finding more animals than their friends, then we compared results afterwards. You can see one of my students filling in an answer above.

You can get it for FREE by clicking on the pictures below:

           

#2 - Jamberry Nails

I'd never heard of Jamberry stick-on nail designs until I was invited to a Jamberry party last week. I'm a little obsessed with cute nails, so I was excited. At the party we got to do one nail on each hand, so I came prepared with a manicure on all but one finger! I got lucky and just happened to get a design that matched my polish. 1.5 weeks later and the nail decal is still going strong!

They had a buy 3, get 1 free deal, so I ordered these designs:

The top left design matches perfectly with my chevron-inspired bathroom and bedroom makeovers, which leads into...

#3 - Chevron Crazy

Seriously, Urban Outfitters has the CUTEST home decor. Just got these in the mail, can't wait to use them!

#4 - Telling Time

I came up with this cute little song set to the tune of "I'm a Little Tea Pot" to help my firsties remember how to tell time. It goes with body movements - using their arms to show the hour hand and minute hand. 

My team is piloting instructional coach rounds for the entire district (which they decided to spring on us the last 2 weeks of school, I might add!) so we were focusing on the GLAD strategy of TPR (Total Physical Response) when I came up with this.

#5 - Sweet Treat Awards

We aren't out of school until next week, but today we did our candy awards - the kids LOVED it! I got the idea from another teacher-blogger to lay down a "red carpet" with butcher paper so it was like a real awards ceremony. The kiddos showing off their treats:

 (FYI - it took them FOREVER to all cover their faces so I could use this on my blog, haha)

You can find the awards on my TpT store by clicking on the picture below: