{Spring Break}

Hi friends,

Before you read any further, please know there is NOTHING educational about this post. It's just me familiarizing myself with my new blog design (pretty cool, huh?) and going crazy with BeFunky!

My Spring Break started off with a girls' trip to wine country. Some of my former co-workers (i.e. 6th grade teachers) and I met up on Friday after school and road tripped it to Fredericksburg.

I discovered BeFunky, the FREE photo editor, and I may have gone a little overboard here. :-)

Anyway, I went on this trip determined to discover my inner wine drinker and spend some quality time with my girlfriends. We arrived in Fredericksburg on Friday night and found our accommodations to be cozy and charming:

As you can see I figured out how to create a border and label my photos. Ha! It's so simple, but I feel quite accomplished.

Anyway, on Saturday morning we made our way to the visitor's center to take the 290 Wine Shuttle. For $20 you can vineyard hop between eight different wineries. Try as I might to enjoy the wine, I made "the face" almost every time I took a sip. It didn't matter which Texas wine I tried, white or red, dry or sweet, I just couldn't find one for me. But, I had a great time catching up and hanging out with the girls! We started off at Grape Creek Vineyards. The atmosphere was nice and I got a wine glass outta the deal. $15 for six tastes and they give you a little score card so you can keep track of what you like. Then, we headed over to Torri De Pietra. This place was packed and it had a live band under a covered pavillion so you could sip and dance, sip some more, dance some more. The wines here had really interesting names like Dirty Girl and Red Flirt. Last, we checked out Mendlebaum Cellars. This place offered Holy Land wines from Isreal. It wasn't as crowded, and you could also sample olive oils from Isreal. This is the only place we purchased bottles of wine. Well, not me. But Miranda and Amy really liked the reds here. That evening we had dinner at Auslander Restaurant and Beirgarten. I'm a pale ale kinda girl, so this place suited me just fine. I don't know if I just don't like Texas wines, or if I'm just not cultured enough (he he he) to enjoy wine. Actually, I did bring home one bottle of Muscat Canelli from Sister Creek Vineyards. This place wasn't on the tour, but I tasted the wine at one of the cellars on Main St. and felt like I had found a winner. The gentleman there told me this particular wine is closer to an Italian wine than the Texas variety. So, maybe I have more European taste (he he he again).

Saturday night we played a card game called Cards Against Humanity. Holy guacamole, Batman! I was cracking up. Look it up!

Sunday morning I spent way more money in just a couple of hours buying gifts for my children, husband, dog, and one of my sisters than I spent on myself all weekend. It's because I'm a mother. Only a mother feels like if she got to get away she should buy gifts for the poor people stuck at home doing the "norm". Sheesh!

On to other matters - can you believe my new blog design???? Tenille at Templates by Tenille fixed me up. It's my birthday gift to me. Now my blog looks better, so I need to be a better blogger. I read about Tenille on a blog called Teach 123. I checked out her portfolio and I was sold. I'll be updating all my new tabs over Spring Break. Once I get my blog in order, maybe I can finally focus on TpT. That's my next project.

Ahhhhhh! Look at the time! Spring forward stinks.

March Currently

I haven't linked up with Farley at Oh, Boy 4th Grade in forever! But, my four year old has made herself a cozy spot on the living room floor out of throw blankets and pillows to watch Netflix Kids, my one year old is chilling out in my bed and watching Dora, my seventeen year old is doing whatever he does in his bedroom, so I've had a few uninterrupted minutes on the computer. What! What?

LISTENING

LOVING

THINKING

WANTING

NEEDING

My teenage son can eat an entire large pizza by himself and still ask for a side of hot wings. 

???????

Guess the answer by leaving a comment. If you read my most recent prior post, you'll know this answer. 

Resource Rewind: February & Five for Friday

Check out my favorite February resources!

Valentine's Day
I HEART<3 this writing activity from What I Have Learned. The reason why I love it is because children brainstorm and write positive affirmations about themselves.

We used this hug bug craft made by From the Pond on the front of a Valentine Card for our parents. On the inside of the card we wrote a note telling the special person how much we love hugs from him/her. 

President's Day/Lincoln/Washington
There are a ton of great President's Day resources on TpT, but my favorite is probably the mini book in this resource from Teacher to the Core.

Now it's time for...

I rearranged my classroom! First, I got a bit of Spring Cleaning Fever. Then, I was thinking about how my room is cute, but could definately be more functional. I decided that next school year I definately needed more floor space at the front of the room because I teach "from the floor" with the kids all sitting on the carpet at front of the room. When you put 20 bodies, even little bodies, down there at the same time it is cramped! We didn't have very much room for math games or a large circle either, so I decided I had to fix it. Then, I thougth, "What am I waiting for?!" Why try a new arrangement on a new group of kids, when you can try it now on a group that already knows the rules and expectations? So I did. I arranged the desks around the outer edge of the room and moved the storage shelves to the center of the room. We are loving the larger space we have at the front of the room. It's A-W-E-S-O-M-E. I'll have to edit this post with a pic. 

You gotta see the portraits we painted of Abe Lincoln! This month we learned about President's Day, George Washington and Abraham Lincoln. We read books, created anchor charts, made a venn diagram, and did some crafts. We did a guided drawing of Lincoln and then used water colors to paint him. These two crafts will part of our patriotic Open House diplay.

Here are some other crafts I'm considering for Open House. We will read and write about the eagle and the White House before we complete each craftivity, of course!

Both of these were Pinterest finds, but here are the links to Mrs. Jump's Class and Adventures in Mrs. Martin's Room where the pins originated from.

Today we built a little 32 square foot raised garden in our back yard. My four year old is so excited to grow strawberries, tomatoes, and peppers. I can't wait until we can actually see a fruit growing on a vine! I hope I have a green thumb.

This week we learned about air in science. On Friday I hosted the Balloon Olympics.

 We competed to see who keep their balloon in the air the longest.

Students used coffee straws and their own air to blow styrofoam balls  across the finish line. Check out the kiddo laying down. He said he laying like a seal!

In my favorite game students blow bubbles then pick one and try to blow it across the room and through a hula hoop.

Did I mention I visited Phoenix and Sedona recently? Well, I did. It was beautiful. My husband had a conference in Phoenix, so I went along for the weekend to do a little sight seeing. Here I am "hanging around".

Dental Health and more

Hi friends,

I'm back for another edition of Five For Friday with Doodle Bugs Teaching. I'm at least a week behind on uploading pictures, so these five things are recent, but not necessarily THIS past week.

FAT FRIDAY - On my campus teachers host a Fat Friday about once per month. This month 1st grade and 5th grade teachers teamed up for a Mardi Gras themed feast of cajun seafood. Concerned about cost, I decided we should try to get some food donated. So, I called up our local Fish Place and....YES! Fish Place was happy and even excited to help out! The store very generously donated a large quantity of food to our staff!!! We purchased some additional food and each us made a salad or dessert to add to the buffet. And, one of our fifth grade teachers made a phenominal pot of gumbo too.

The entire staff had more than enough to eat and I ended up bringing home some jambalaya, salad, and cupcakes. Dinner = DONE. Does your campus host something similar? My previous school  had a birthday breakfast once per month hosted by groups of teachers.

The salad I made for Fat Friday was a Broccoli Bacon Vinegarette Salad that is to die for! I got the recipe a few years ago from another teacher. I think she got it from HEB Central Market. You gotta try it:

This is a picture I found online, but this looks just like it. Here's what you need to make it:

3 large crown of broccoli
1/2 c. of mayonnaise
2/3 c. of bacon vinegareete dressing (found at HEB in front of the grill where the lady cooks and talks about receipes on the weekend)
sunflower seeds
Craisans
shredded cheddar
fresh cooked bacon

Mix mayo and vinegarette in a bowl. You can vary the portions to taste. You have it right when you can't taste any mayo. Add cut up broccoli crowns and mix until dressed. Add all other items and mix together.

February is Dental Health Month, so we did a little reading about primary and permanent teeth, how many teeth we have, and how to care for them. Then, my firsties had a blast counting their own teeth (and gaps) and creating marshmallow teeth mouths. Many students decided to try to make a model of their own mouths with gaps in just right spaces! I got the idea from Cindy Sweeny's TpT store.

We pressed the molars with our fingers to make them look a litte larger. Notice the gap left for a missing front tooth:

Then, we drew and colored a tongue inside the mouth. The kids were excited take this project home to show their parents. 

Next, we wrote about it, of course!

This resource is from Susan Jones' TpT store. She writes an incredible little blog called TGIF - Thank God It's First Grade!

The 100th day of school was a week ago, but I have to share this story. My class was making their 100th day trail mix using ten each of ten different snacks. The snacks were in little cups. I kept seeing a student eat directly out the cup and I would say, "M****, don't eat from the cup, sweetie. Put the goldfish on your graph. You can eat it when you're finished." The little girl told me she wasn't eating from the cup. A few minutes later I saw her again, so I repeated my instructions again. Again, she assured me she was not eating from the cup, she was putting the goldfish om the graph. The third time I thought I saw her eating the snacks I went over to more closely inspect what she was doing and this is what I saw:

The boxes on the graph were too small to fit the entire snack in so she was biting each snack down to size to fit in each square!!! Ba-ha-ha-ha. Pobrecita!!!! In her mind, she was not eating directly from the cup. She was making her snacks fit and she was going to eat what was on the graph when she was finished. Next year, I'll make my own graph - with bigger boxes! How funny! Look at the headless fish; just the little tails are left. He he he.

Sping break is coming!!!! Woo-hoo! The first weekend I'm going on a girls' trip to do a little wine tasting in the Texas Hill Country. The following weekend I'm taking my girlies to Galveston to visit Schlitterbahn and Moody Gardens with one of my friends and her daughter. CAN.NOT.WAIT. What are your plans???

Have a great week,

Groundhogs, Clouds, Space, and Stained Teeth Experiment

...well, more like Five for Saturday. I'm late to the party.

I started off the week in Arizona. It was b-e-a-u-tiful! My husband had a conference on Monday and Tuesday, but we flew out on Saturday morning to take in some sights. It was the first time to Arizona for both of us. I wanted to see the Grand Canyon, but due to some scheduling conflicts we had to stay closer to Phoenix so I settled for Sedona. I was NOT dissapointed. We took a Pink Jeep Tour and it was amazing!

You gotta go if you get the chance. Anyway I flew back to Houston on Monday, so it was a four day work week for me. Here's some highlights:

The end of last week learned about groundhogs and Groundhog Day. All but one of my students predicted Phil would NOT see his shadow and spring was just around the corner. All but that one student was wrong. Sad face. My kiddos also had a blast figuring out who could whistle and who could not...because groundhogs can make a whistling noise. Then, to start off this week we did some All About... writing and made a groundhog craftivity.

We finished up our weather review by studying clouds. We made these cotton ball clouds and hung them in the hallway. Making the Cirrus clouds look whispy was a challenge for my firsties.

Next, we started a unit on space. We learned a song to help us remember the order of the planets...the same exact song I still remember from fifth grade. Thank you Ms. Galloway and Ms. Pursley. Except now Pluto is a dwarf planet. Sheesh! We did some guided coloring and pasting of the eight planets in order:

But, the absolute favorite activity was on Friday when we learned about the phases of the moon with a little assistance from the Oreo cookie.

Oreo Moon phases worksheet by Amanda Whitaker

This week we will be learning about dental hygiene. But, we started our Dental Health experiment a little early because our school's science fair was on Thursday. The upper grades are required to participate and students in the lower grades can participate too. Anyway, I created these posters based on an experiment I remember from first grade. Thank you Ms. Miller. The idea is to see the effect that water, coke, and tea may have on your teeth. Substitute hard boiled eggs for teeth. We made our predictions, formed a hypothesis, checked our submerged eggs daily, and recorded our results. When I converted the file to a pdf so I could print it poster size, I guess the words in the teeth shifted on the first poster. Oops.

Monday is our 100th day celebration and Friday is our Friendship party. It's going to be an interesting week! Have a good one,