The First Grade Garden

January 10, 2013

Throwback Thursday & A Little Freebie

Can it really be Thursday?! Wow does time fly when you're having ~~mental breakdowns~~ fun. I mean let's not kid ourselves... the first week back after an amazingly relaxing 2 week break is ~~kind of~~ extremely difficult. Okay, I'm probably being a little dramatic but don't tell me you didn't feel the same!

Here's my throwback for the week:

Yes... that's me when I was in first grade. We had our candid school photos today and thought it would be fun to surprise the kiddos with a photo of myself when I was their age. Let's just say they about feel off their chairs when they saw it. Too funny!!

So in the midst of all the back-to-school-craziness, I've created a new AR line to match my owl and polka dot theme (pictures to come). I love this management system for AR. It's so easy to explain and very user friendly for the kids. When there's an open computer, the next number in line can help themselves.

For a short time I'm going to offer this cute little creation as a freebie. CLICK HERE to grab a copy of "Whooo's Ready for an AR test?"

How do you manage AR quizzes??

January 02, 2013

A New Year of Old Resolutions

Happy New Year!

I really can't believe that's it's a new year. I honestly feel like we just did this whole December holiday-thing last month. Oh.my.word does it go fast.

I must say, 2012 was a wonderful year. I started my 3rd year teaching and can truly say that it's getting a little bit easier (which gives me hope for the coming years, haha). My beautiful sister recently got engaged to her prince charming and we can't wait for the wedding this coming November. Rob & I are doing wonderful and couldn't be happier with our 3 little love-bugs (Clockwise) Wrigley, Luca & our newest addition to the family, Bruno.

And most importantly, my amazing family is healthy and happy!

Needless to say, I'm really looking forward to 2013.

And here I am again, making another resolution to keep up with my blog. I guess last years whole "making more time for myself" thing wasn't as successful as I'd hoped. I found myself spending a huge chunk of my time at school and when not, doing school at home. Like I said, it has gotten a little bit easier this year but boy is it still busy. I don't know how you all do it with kiddos of your own. I'd probably go cray-cray!

So let's get the year started off right... I'm linking up with Farley over at Oh' Boy 4th Grade for her January currently.

I hope you all had a wonderful holiday break and for those of you who have already gone back (bless your hearts) I hope it was a smooth transition! Guess I'd better get back to prepping myself for next Monday ;)

What are your New Year Resolutions??

January 26, 2012

Martin Luther King

Talk about a ~~crazy~~ draining 2 weeks. Between visiting my closest cousin in ICU & spending time with family in town from CO, 28 wound-up littles and getting sick it's pretty safe to say that this girl is B-E-A-T. I couldn't be happier that tomorrow is Friday. Boy do I need a couple days of relaxation.

I wanted to stop by and share a few things our class did for MLK and give a few FREEBIES that I created. We were fortunate to have the day off on MLK Day so we spent a good chunk of time Tuesday and Wednesday of last week focusing on his great accomplishments and coming up with some dreams of our own.

We started by reading a couple fabulous MLK stories and watched a video of "Martin's Big Words" on YouTube.

If you know me, you know that I can't pass up a good writing craftivity. My kiddos just LOVE the word craftivity and can't get enough of them! We did a little TLC craft... click HERE to get the directions. They had a blast cutting our their own 'Martin's' and they couldn't have tuurned out any more adorable!!