Wednesday, October 28, 2009

Baby Shower and School Stuff

My sister -in-law, Camie, Is due with a baby boy on Nov. 10th (the Marine Core's b-day which Mike is seriously excited about) and I thought it would be fun to throw her a shower!
We ate tons of food, played a couple games, and watched Camie open some great gifts.


Her husband, Mike, made a guest appearance and brought their daughter, Calla, since a lot of people there hadn't met her yet. She is going to be a cute big sister once she realizes she has a brother! Right now she kisses the "ball" in Camie's tummy.



This wasn't nearly all the gifts yet! She's a lucky girl! (Oh yeah, her son is a lucky boy too :))

The invites


On a totally different note, my class has been awesome so far! I am having a really good time with them this year. I am feeling so lucky! This doesn't mean there aren't days where I think they are all crazy, but it's such huge difference from last year! We read this cute book called, Glad Monster, Sad Monster. Each page describes a feeling and things that make the monster feel that way. Then there are masks for each emotion for the kids to put on and tell what makes them feel that way. At first they were embarrassed to do it, but soon every child wanted a turn.



I was surprised how much I learned about each kid during this. Some have horrible siblings that ignore them or injure them, some have parents who are ill a lot, many of the kids have had bad experiences in water, and some just wanted attention. I have to say that I am scared for the day when my future kids go to school because kids spill dirt like no other! No shame and nothing sacred.

I have several things I do to promote good behavior as a class and as individuals. As a group they try to get pebbles from one jar to another by following directions, being really quiet, or just doing something good. Once they earn the whole jar they get a surprise. This time around they got candy to eat while painting some canvas bags that we are going to use to put their center work in. They had a lot of fun doing it. There were a lot of other cute bags but I didn't feel like editing all the faces out of the pictures. I wish I could post my students' pictures because those are the best ones! Oh well.


Wednesday, October 7, 2009

Murphy's Law & Cracker Country... not together

I have never believed in Murphy's Law, where everything that can go wrong will, nor do I think people should always whine about how horrible their lives are and give the whole, "woe is me" speech. However...have you ever had days/periods of time where you believe Murphy's Law might really exist? I'm not being totally serious of course, but there are days when I can't believe how many things can really get in the way. My life is ridiculously wonderful so I'll stop here. Just throwing it out there after a very frustrating couple of days which have followed an almost laughable series of events.

Just to prove I'm not a downer, here are some pictures of my 2nd graders' field trip to Cracker Country. It is a turn of the century historical site with hands on activities. It was very hot and buggy, but the kids had a really good time despite the fact that I thought they were going to die of hunger since we ate at 12:15 instead of 11:00 as usual. :)

Making candles


Inside of one of the old houses they transported here


Making Butter

Ironing

Getting the juice out of sugar cane to make into honey

Train depot

A turn of the century house

The kids were worn out after just trying some chores for a few hours! I think it was good for them. Too bad most went home to video games.