Monday Made it (Yeah it's Tuesday)

Last week was the first time I linked up with Tara for Monday Made it and now I'm on a roll. I don't know if it is just the end of summer is near so I better get my craft on or what. This week I worked on a couple of projects.
First project is a K to take first day of pictures with. I've seen this on several blogs and pinterest and I think it's super cute. I made a picture frame for last year's first day of school picture. Since I keep my kids for 2 years I like the idea of doing something different.

My colors in my classroom are all over the place. I'm trying to go with bright colors more than primary colors. 

The next project is a can to put my box tops in. This is such an unnecessary project but I ate the last of my almonds and thought this is the perfect container for something. 

I thought it turned out cute. (I know cute is not that important but I like cute. Makes me happy.)

The last project is a little something for some of my friends at school. I still have one more to make. One of my fellow k/1 teachers is a guy and I couldn't decide whether he would like it or not. But I found some boy scrapbook paper so I think it will be manly enough. I just need to add the post it notes. I got those yesterday at Target but they are still in the car. 

So those are my Monday made its for the week. Chris and I went to JoAnn's on Friday night. (I know we're wild and crazy) I got some fabric for a couple more projects. I'm pretty excited about. So I'll be back next week with some new projects. I haven't busted out my sewing machine in a while so hopefully it will go well. If not, I'll still post. 

I'm headed for a little more back to school shopping with a teacher friend. We have to have partners in crime. Yesterday my partner in crime was my sweet niece. She was very helpful. I'm not sure if it's a good thing or not. I didn't say a word and she knew that I was putting stuff in the cart for school. She would say is that for your class? So cute. 

Be sure to head over to Tara's blog to check out the other Monday Made its!

100th day Recap

Last Monday was our 100th day so I'm a little late in the posting this. But better late than never. My day on Monday got a little thrown off by a meeting in the afternoon during the 100th day activities.
I had asked my kids to send in 100 items and we still haven't done anything with those. I just realized that they are still sitting in the box they put them in when they brought them. Whoops.

 I hit 100 hershey kisses around the room that had the numbers on them. The kids worked in groups to find the kisses while the rest of the class worked on writing their numbers to 100. They found all but 3 of them the first day. I found the others the next day. I had them put their hershey kisses on the 100s chart which wasn't my best plan. The next day when we were going over the numbers we used the promethean board and highlighted the numbers. That worked a lot better.

 We also made a 100 day snack. This was the first year I didn't ask students to bring in specific snacks and that was a mistake. I just asked for donations and we only got 6 different things. So the kids got to choose 4 things they wanted 20 of instead of just 10. But we were doing this at the very end of the day so the kids had to take their snacks home.

 The last activity we did was making a picture out of 100 squares. I asked my assistant to get the 100 squares for each student together the week before. One of the middle school teaches accused me of cruel and unusual punishment. The kids did a great job and I realized when uploading these pictures I didn't take one of the final products. I'll have to do that tomorrow and add it to the post. they were so quiet and working so hard. It was interesting to see the ones who made a picture and those that just glued them down all over.

The 100th day is a prime example of one of my biggest downfalls as a teacher. I get these great ideas and never seem to have time to finish them. I had the materials to make 100 day hats and had plans to do some counting with their collections but we just didn't get it done. I have such a hard time balancing fun activities with all the required learning we need to do. I had bought stickers and book marks from Target earlier in the month and didn't find them until Friday. Four days after the 100th day. Does anyone else have this problem? Please tell me I'm not the only one. I hope to be back later this week with what we've been doing for persuasive writing. So far these lessons are going well.

Monday Made it on Tuesday

So I just can't seem to follow a schedule period. Not even when they are set by other people. I've been seeing all the Monday Made it posts all summer long and have wanted to join in but I hadn't motivated myself to make much. Now with only like 5 weeks left of summer, I have to get it in gear.I'm setting the goal of participating in this linky the rest of the summer. I made 2 trips to hobby lobby yesterday and a trip to Walmart so I'm almost completely ready for all kinds of crafting. I still need to go to the hardware store. I want to make some of the crate seats. I've got a few projects I need to get materials from school for. I'm heading into school for the first time this summer today. Well, as soon as I can motivate myself to get off the computer and get going. Ok so on to what I made for this week's post.

This was a project I had seen a few places on pinterest and a couple of other blogs. I think my inspiration was from The Silver Lining blog.You can see her version and instructions. I made mine a little different. I had pinned a couple times this website all about organization. The author of the website suggested having a place to put all your papers that gather on your desk. So this is my solution. I add some ribbon loops and hope to hang it up using some 3M hooks.

I have been wanting to make a retelling rope ever since I saw Kelli from Castles and Crayons guest post on Teaching in High Heels. You can check her post out here.  I was at Hobby Lobby yesterday and decided I was for sure going to get the pieces to make it. It was on my summer bucket list and something needed to get done on that list. I was in Hobby Lobby with Sophie and she loved this section of the store. By the time, we left I wasn't sure what wooden cut outs I had. Sophie kept putting them in my basket. The tree is for setting, gingerbread man is for characters, football for what kicks off the story, 3 buttons for beginning, middle, and end. Then a bow for what ties up the story. I think it turned out pretty cute.

My last project is some pointers. I bought the stuff to make these over Christmas break and never got around to it. I don't know why. It took me maybe 5 minutes to make. I hope they hold up. That will be the kicker. I might make a couple more. I still have some wooden cut outs that Sophie put in the cart. I want to let the kids use them on big books and reading books. Anyway, I'm excited I finally linked up and I might need someone to hold me accountable. Check out all the other great projects at 4th Grade Frolics.




On a couple of side notes, I'm contributing to a couple of good giveaways you should check out. I usually don't blog about giveaways. But I'm giving some things away, so I can't participate but you should check them out. The first is at Wild About Teaching. Lacey is up to 500 followers. Check out her giveaway here.



The second one is at Mrs. Shelton's Kindergarten. She's celebrating 100 followers. She's a fellow Tennessee blogger and since we are the volunteer state. Several Tennessee bloggers volunteered to help her out. Check out her giveaway here.