graduation leftover

I've been meaning to share this item from our preschool graduation because it's absolutely the most precious thing ever.  These paper chains are waiting to go on stage.  I couldn't find a picture of them onstage, but use your imagination.... Each class has a long paper chain being held up by three pained dowel rods.  Each teacher wrote a prayer for each child on a strip and a separate prayer on a separate strip for their family.  These were organized and grouped by child with a white link in between. 

We carried them in with the kids as they walked in for graduation and then they sat on stage behind the kids during most of the program.  After the program they were taken to the hallway so the families could take their child's links home.    I cut out the ribbon like room labels on my silhouette.

There are literally hundreds of prayers written out specifically for each little friend and their family. It made for a really cute onstage decoration, a neat way to minister to the attendees at our graduation (many were surprised to learn that each link held a handwritten prayer from the teachers- we love our kiddos!) and a sweet memento to take home and save forever. 

door hanger copy cat

I saw a burlap bag floral door piece while out shopping with some of the gals I used to teach preschool with.  We were visiting all the fancy cute downtown boutiques where I buy nothing but get ideas.  It was $55 and something I could pretty easily make. 

I came home and got right to work.  Mine is all made with materials on hand.  I would have used different flowers, but this is what I had in the closet.  I made up a simple lined burlap sack with corners at the bottom for depth.  The only tricky part was the burlap flower.  I ended up hot gluing it in a ripple pattern wrapping it around a few times. 

I think it's a fun alternate to our typical door wreath and will be cute in my classroom when I start robbing the house of decorations.  However, at my price I could just make another.

teacher thank you with thank you

 We really came up with a cute teacher thank you this spring.  It came together at the last minute, as all great gifts do!  It could have been done a little more economically had I shopped around for more inexpensive thankyous.  It was last minute as I said. 

 

 
We bundled up several packages of adorable thank you note cards, a sheet of stamps, and a cute little card I made through silhouette.
 

 

I borrowed the floral image that says many thanks from a google image search (I searched many thanks clip art).  In photoshop, I added the little saying "Many 'thank-yous' to you because we thank you for a great year!" In silhouette I cut it all out with the cute scalloped edge.
 

 
We do thank our teachers!  Lou wouldn't pose with his teacher on the first day of school this year but he was happy to by the end. She earned all the thank you we could have given her!

 

 
Heck, he'd hardly pose for me that first day of kindergarten.
 

 
Bee and her sweet teacher.  First day of second grade.
 

 
 

 
Last day.

shorts turned purse- a remake

 I was feeling like I wanted a fun lazy summer purse. Something easy going and slouchy.  I picked out a pattern online and then went to my stash to find some fabric.  I found a pair of old navy XL shorts I had purchased on clearance for 99 cents just for a remake.  They didn't have my size but I loved the orange/salmon color and white sailboats. It wasn't enough fabric for the pattern I chose, so I scrapped the pattern and just went with the shorts.

Basically I just pulled out the stitches in the crotch running from one leg to the other turning it into an open at the bottom skirt shape.  Then turned them inside out and sewed up the front and back crotch area to flatten and even it all out, took in the sides, and sewed the bottom together, and added some corners at the bottom to give it depth. I lined it with an old pillowcase and made a strap and belt to go through the original belt loops.  Not a tutorial by any means, sorry about the 'short'ness of the directions.

All of the original shorts pockets remained. The front pockets...

And the back pockets...

 
99 cents for the shorts, 10 cents a pieces for 2 old pillowcases, 40 minutes I lets the kids watch some silly show on TV and a dusted off sewing machine.  This was a successful remake!

icecream sensory play

We went to a friend's birthday party last week and we took a really fun gift.  Our little buddy likes to play restaurant and loves when we loan him our sensory bins.  We combined the two and made an ice-cream parlor kit.
 

 
He loved it! Like, really loved it!
 

 
Most of the items came from the dollar store or hobby lobby.  If I was doing this for preschool or my own kids, I could have reused things from home and it would have been cheaper to put together.
 

 
Here's what we included (and approximate prices in case you're figuring out if this will be affordable for your kiddos)
 
1 large bag of white pom poms (Hobby Lobby  {HL} $2.99)
2 medium bags of brown pom poms (HL .99 each)  -I had wanted pink too, but had to put some back- I was going over budget)
2 small bags tiny multi colored pom poms for sprinkles (99 cents each HL)
2 bananas ($3.00 each from HL in the floral arranging area)
ice-cream scooper (25 cents from goodwill)
1 package (2 in pkg) of baked potato dishes for banana split containers (Dollar Tree {DT} 1$)
1 pack (3 in pack) little blue bowls (DT 1$)
1 pack multi colored baby silverware (DT $1)
1 birthday shot glass (DT 1$)
1 large bowl to hold ice-cream (DT -wedding area 1$)
1 bunch of fake flowers (DT 1$)
plastic salt and pepper shakers for sprinkles container (DT $1)
Red pom poms and plastic jar- from home added at last minute for cherries)
frame from IKEA $1
menu cards- I made myself at home using Word.
 
 

 
If I was making this for preschool, I would not let them pour out the tiny pom poms.  It was time consuming to pick them all out to reset.

 

 
Other than the free for all with colored M&Ms at the party I think the icecream was the most popular item!  At one point the birthday boy was missing and he was found up in his room playing ice-cream parlor. 

color blaze 5K

 
This may have been the most fun 5K!  My sister drove down and brought a friend and we all ran in the race with the kids. Here's our clean before picture.

 
Bee and Lou were coloring people, even total strangers before the race.

 
We're covered and haven't even started. 

 
This race brought out a different population than the other 5K we participate in.  There were lots of families, lots of groups of friend, lots of walkers.

 
Lots of people brought kids and didn't bring a stroller or buggy. It was HOT.  They looked miserable a half mile in.  I pushed both kids at times in our bike trailer.  I looked miserable a half mile in. Some of the trail was off road.  I have never taken the trailer off road, and never will again.

 
Bee really did run most of the race, probably at least 2 3/4 miles.

 
We made my sister's friend a medal.  It was her first 5K and was a little disappointed when she learned there would be no medals.  She's also a teacher and stayed the whole weekend with us.  There was lots of teacher talk.  Poor hubby.   I wish I had another brother for her to marry, I want to keep this girl!

 

 

 

 
Post race, my sister entered a hula hoop contest.  She won.  She's multi-talented like that.

 
The dye stained our skin a bit.  Bee looked like a lizard for a few days.

The next day we took them all to the theme park and wore them all out again.

foudn this other half started summer blog post...

I just found this half started post about being busy this summer... He's what I started to say awhile back.

 I fell like summer should be half over but we've just had a few weeks. 

We've been hanging out at the theme park:

Doing some yard sale shopping.  This cardboard house was obtained for $2.  It provided a few fun hours of play and then was rained on and tossed out.

Lou man finished up baseball for the season.

On a trip to Hubby's parents house, we discovered that the slide dear hubby pushed me off of when I was in 4th grade and he was in 5th has been removed.  We actually got one last 'slide' when we spotted it waiting to be hauled off. 

 

Bee and Lou both got these for their birthdays (Bee a little early).  Have you seen these Boogie boards?  It's about the coolest thing.  They are LCD screens that you write on.  You use a stylus pen and doodle or write or whatever and then a button clears the screen. They were great for a long car trip and have been fun to play with at home. 

Schoolwork is one way to earn TV/screen time this summer, so the kids have been doing their schoolwork before they do about anything else.  So far, it's fun for everyone.

We've been taking friends with us wherever we go which adds to the fun. And chaos.

We had a little yard sale.  Lou made more money than anyone else. 

I fancied up the neighborhood girls' hair.  I learned how to do these hair wraps when I was in junior high.  It was very cool in 1990 something.  Bee and my little neighbor girls think it's cool again. That makes me very cool. 

There's been some kite flying and other outdoor fun. 

So, that's where I left it.  Between this one and yesterday's post, you should be all caught up.

MIA- that me

I've been MIA for almost a month.  In a little over 4 years of blogging, this is the longest break I've ever taken by a long shot.  Enjoy random summer shots as I explain...

(This maybe the stupidest thing I've ever paid full price for... Lou picked out some summer shoes for the pool and theme park.  He wears them though....)

It's summer and the kids and I are out and we're staying happily busy. Also, I'm getting things ready in 'land of third grade' and that is keeping me fantastically and happily busy.  I'm going through boxes and boxes of things from years ago when I last taught elementary school.  I've been going through four years of preschool materials and weeding out items and sharing and passing along others. 

(The logan berries have come and gone.  We picked this many every day for two weeks.) 
 

(It made the most delicious addition to strawberry jam, which hubby helped make!  Afterward, he said, "I don't know how you do this by yourself."  Thank you very much.)

(That's a happy kitchen counter- every surface is covered with the making of jam.  Those would be the kitchen cabinets I'd like to paint this summer...)

The biggest project has been going though over a dozen boxes of files.  I've taught pre-k, 2nd,3rd and 6th and at times wrote 75% of my own curriculum.  I loved doing that, but I accumulated tons of resources and files and papers and booklets and brochures and maps and outdated dittos.  I've gone through each box, each file, each page.  I've tossed half.  At least.  I had kept multiple copies of most pages and class sets of anything I had copied and we didn't get to that year.  Some pages got made into scratch pads, because I am my father's daughter.  My sister may have wanted to make fun of me to my face, she refrained and probably just did it behind my back.  I might have too.

 

 I had to formally apologize to my sweet hubby who has (not without complaint) moved these boxes from house to house over the past 8 years that I haven't worked full time.  Some boxes have been with us all almost 14 years of our marriage.... sorry dear.

 (There have been few if any garden post, I can't even remember... it's not my best year.  My effort is low this year.  Too many pots in the fire as they say.  We did grow a few radishes... that is a radish, right?  I don't even like them. Tomatoes are behind schedule)
 

 
I'm 75% moved into my new classroom. There are still books to bring over and the newly sorted and organized files to slip into their new files cabinets.  This is what I started with...

 

 

 
I've cleaned and tidied a little and brought some of my things in, but I can't do anything with the bulletin boards until August and can't get really set up until right before school.  Summer camp inhabits my room until the week school starts.  It's a lesson in flexibility.  I'm working on all the 'behind the scenes' things.

We had a new staff orientation in June and I must say I felt like an old maiden.  There were three of us 'returning from being home with our kiddos' gals and other 8 or so were fresh from college pups.  Five are getting married this summer.  The talk at lunch that day was half the table (the pups) talking about wedding colors and lighting at the church and the other end (us 3 old girls and the admin staff) discussing past class pets, students we are now friends with on Facebook, and trying to keep up with new technology.  As it turns out, one of the new principals is younger than me.  I'm not sure when that happened, my boss and my dentist are younger than me.

(Lou got another haircut.  He begged daddy to do it and then freaked out a few swipes of the clippers in.  We were fairly committed at that point!  Yep, we cut hair in the storage/laundry/gross basement room)

My other non-blogging includes that my new school email and blogger are both on google and I can't seem to be logged into both at once.  If I'm doing anything with school email then I'm signed in and don't want to witch out to be blogging signed in.  Anyway, I'm sure there's a fix.

(One of my dear students gifted me a gift card to the donut shop... the kids and I went and had to send this thank you)

Last excuse. I' used to do a lot of my blogging while on the treadmill at home.  We joined the Y again.  I'm exercising there now.  I'd better too, after all those donuts.

(This bee picture was taken with my phone.  Technology just amazes and baffles me .... I'm going to have to befriend a pup.)

 

So.  I don't know if I'll blog much this summer, or once school starts.  I don't know.  I have projects photographed and more planned, but they might sit in the camera all summer.  We'll see.