Hobby Lobby Monday's with Mom

The past couple of Monday's after taking care of other things I have been able to scour the sales at Hobby Lobby with my mom. They still don't have party supplies on sale yet.. :0(  This weekend though I stopped by Wal-mart for bugspray and found the cutest chairs for my reading center!! Check them out! They were only $5 (I seem to see a trend developing)

I've got more good stuff we found at Hobby Lobby to show you but I will have to post it later. For now here is a pic of my mother and I having fun shopping for my room!

Great Expectations Quotes

Today I was reading the Great Expectations website and pulled some quotes for my room. My school is a Great Expectations school. I made my own quotes to laminate and hang! I was so excited I finally found a program to create things and that it is easy to use. Here is what I came up with. I don't think it's too bad for my first try! I might tweek them and add some printables for the Great Expectations 8 Expectations as classroom rules.

Yea!!

Melted Snowman Craft~

I love this idea, but I am not sure it is classroom worthy, but would be a fun recylcing project or Christmas project. I found it on Pintrest but here is the original site it came from: www.craftelf.com

Directions:

Snowman Craft! This winter craft is easy for kids to make is a good use for a recycled water bottle.

Materials and Supplies

Craft Supplies:

• 8 oz water bottle *
• 12" piece of twine
• 10" x 3/4" piece of plaid fabric
• Small amount black & orange craft foam
• Ultra fine black permanent marker
• Vinegar
• Scrap of white paper
• Teabag & cup of hot water (you could substitute parchment paper?)
• Glitter snow
• Hole punch - standard size

Craft Instructions

1. Rip a piece of white paper to measure approximately 2" x 1 1/4".  Place the paper in a cup of tea.  Leave the tea bag in the cup with the paper for a more antiqued look.  Let the paper soak for 10-20 minutes until the paper reaches your desired color.  Gently wrinkle up the paper and squeeze out the excess tea.  You want the paper to be wrinkled.  Carefully unfold the paper and place it on 2 layers of paper towel to dry.  Tea does stain so be careful where you place your paper to dry.
2. Remove the label from your bottle and remove any glue residue.
3. Fill the bottle 2/3 of the way with water and add a dash of vinegar.
4. Punch out 7 circles from craft foam using a standard size hole punch.
5. Cut out a carrot shape from orange craft foam. Our "carrot" is 7/8" long.  Draw 3 lines on each side of the carrot with a permanent marker.
6. Drop the black circles and the nose into the bottle of water.
7. Add some glitter snow to your bottle.  The amount of glitter snow is up to you. We put in just enough to cover the surface of the water.  The craft foam face pieces and a good amount of the glitter snow should float because of what they are made of.
8. Cap your bottle and tie one end of the twine to the neck of the bottle
9. Cut a strip of plaid fabric 10" x 3/4".  I used pinking shears to cut this as it helps to keep the material from fraying but don't worry if you don't have any - just use regular scissors.
10. Tie the plaid fabric strip around the neck of the bottle on top of the string.
11. With a 3/16" hole punch or the tip of a pen, make a hole in one corner of the tea dyed paper but before doing so, be sure the paper is completely dry.
12. Using the permanent marker, write your message on the tea dyed paper.  We wrote "Melted Snowman - In search of Winter"
13. Using the loose end of the twine, attach the message using the hole you made in the corner.

* You could also make this Melted Snowman using recycled baby food jars.  If you do this you might want to cut a circle from black felt and glue it to the top of the lid.

Read more: http://www.craftelf.com/Craft_elf_Holiday_Christmas_melted_snowman_craft_project.htm#ixzz2RJGf49NA

Calming Jar! I love this idea!

I found this on pintrest but here is the original site it came from: http://www.robynoakenfold.com/blog/the-calming-jar/

I think this is an awesome addition to behavior management!

If you want to make your own calming jar (good for moms as well) they are really easy! All you need to do is:

• jar or bottle with a lid (preferably plastic for the classroom)
• 1 tbsp of clear glue (or glitter glue) to each 1 cup of (hot) water to fill the jar
• add in glitter (I added about 1 inch of glitter)
• food colouring (optional)

More Stuff for My Room!!

I feel like I am running blind since I haven't seen my new room for the fall, but I have to collect things over time so I can hit the sales and stretch my budget for my room! My mom and I went shopping, hobby lobby had the usual 50% off certain sections so it was a great opportunity to get some cute storage at a steal. Trying to figure out what to get was driving me nuts because again, I have no idea what kind of storage or space I am going to have to put things. I decided to buy them anyway, and if I need to return or exchange later I can. This week ribbon, home decor/metals among other things were on sale, check out what I got so far.

These baskets were half off!!!! $5 each! It doesn't get better than that! I am thinking these will be used for my ten literacy centers I am using that I found on another teacher blog! But I am undecided, so please suggest something if you have ideas! I feel like this is my first year all over again.

You knew I couldn't resist! $5 again at hobby lobby! I am going to hang this by the door for restroom/office/etc. passes!

This was a center idea for spelling. They also had their stamps on sale and the ink pads 40% off, so each on of these was about $6! Great for the kids to stamp out spelling words, sentences, or to use in any literacy activity.

More center storage, my thought is this is for math manipulatives for math centers. I got these on sale, 50% off they were only $1.80 each!



Decided on a Room Theme Finally!

After looking over so many ideas for my room theme I finally decided on the Owl Theme from schoolgirlstyle.com. I have downloaded her content and I am in process of making the center signs, name plates, etc. and laminating them. I have been shopping on the web and in the store looking for stuff to go in the room and I have found that Hobby Lobby seems to be an amazing source for stuff especially in the spring/summer when they have lots of bright colors and seasonal items that are awesome! Another great thing about Hobby Lobby is the rotate half off sales every other weekend in different departments! I made my first purchase for my room!

I also found a plethora of Owl stuff while I was there! I am holding back for the sale and I also don't want to get so over excited I buy stuff I don't need. I haven't been able to see my room yet which also makes it hard to plan without knowing what kind of wall space and storage I will have. Just a peek at some of the stuff I saw:

And I found this little Owl with hooks on it that is perfect for hanging bathoom passes on by the door!

In the meantime I have been putting together and activities binder and standards binder for second grade. Pintrest is awesome in addition to all the teachers blogs I have come across for ideas! I am off to find new ideas! Please share if you have any!!!



Love this idea of organizing ribbons from one of my favorite blogs!

This is from The Sweet Life of Third Grade Blog. This blog is on my favorite blog list so go check it out!

Still figuring out a few things...

I finally had a moment to sit down and look around. I taught first grade for a year then took a 2 1/2 year break to complete my master's degree, now that I am done I am retuning to elementary school. Over the past 2 1/2 years I have been studying criminology so I am trying to make a thinking shift back to what I call "cutesy". I have found some awesome blogs and websites by teachers that have great ideas on centers etc. I have also found that Pintrest offers a plethora of ideas! I am working on figuring out how to add some graphics to my page. If any is reading this and has pointers please share!

Oh boy, I am green under the collar!

This is the first blog and I have no idea what I am doing admittingly. I am trying to figure out all the settings that control the blog features. Okay, so I will post this and we will see how it comes out!