Hallelujah, it’s Saturday.
And I have coffee.
And no plans until noon. And then we are heading to Dave and Buster’s for a church volunteer appreciation thing. Apparently, I’m going to be appreciated. And I’m very appreciative of that. I mean, hello? How sweet!
I put this on Instagram and my personal Facebook page.
Look how cute Miss Murphie is. I told her to sit and she did. She will also bark on command. However, when I ask her to bark, it scares me so I don’t do it all that often. I was trying to be all creative and wow, what a photographic genius, she missed her calling and man, that’s a great shot, but instead, everyone remarked on how much I’d grown (including my own mother).
Which is fine. I love looking tall. It actually doesn’t happen all that often, if you can believe it.
But mostly, I’m concerned with my cankles.
I am pretty sure this photo was just taken at an unfortunate angle and my ankles are further down in the shot, but they got cut off. At least, I’m pretty sure that’s what happened.
And, seeing as how I took this photo, we’re going to go with that.
It’s a geyser!
Let me explain.
We painted.
Some of us painted paper and others of us painted paper and our shirts and our hands.
It’s amazing that some kids don’t get any paint on themselves whatsoever at all, and others have it everywhere. I also had three girls who thought it would be fun to paint their entire palm.
It was not fun for me, FYI. I forgot to mention that little ditty in the DO NOT speech. DO NOT PAINT YOUR EYELIDS AND PRETEND YOU HAVE ON MAKEUP, AND DO NOT PAINT YOUR FACE AND PRETEND YOU ARE AN ANIMAL, AND DO NOT PAINT YOUR PALMS!!!!!
Silly me. I forgot to mention that last little part.
So, obviously, we needed to wash our hands.
And halfway through, our sink went on the fritz.
All of a sudden, while the water was running, the water fountain began to run, too.
So I did what anyone would do.
I turned the water off.
And when I turned the water off, the water fountain spigot shot water way up high and across at a forceful speed and shot water into the wall.
The kids in the line waiting to wash their hands gasped loudly and then started laughing.
I know. I’m so funny. Look at my party trick.
So I had to turn the water back on in order to get the water fountain to calm down to a trickle. The main water spigot and the water fountain spigot were in ca-hoots, apparently.
I called the office for help, but when I said we were having a water emergency, I think they took that to mean we were thirsty and could wait awhile. Or we need rain. Which we do. Either way, they took their sweet time responding to my water emergency.
So I went next door to get my partner (because I was laughing and this was funny and I may have turned the water off a couple of more times so my kids could see the water fountain go spastic again and again) and I showed my partner my party trick.
And do you know what she said?
She said, “You need to take a picture of this for your blog.”
So I did.
So there you go.
Eventually, our custodian showed up and turned off the water by way of under the sink. I guess I could have done that.
But that’s not funny.
We have a new Write the Room Center thanks to my friend, Christina! I love it because it bumped the write the room center up a notch. My kids have to copy an entire sentence, remember capitalization and punctuation, and read the sentences to a friend.
The little guy in the picture was using a red marker because he had a boo-boo on his finger and couldn’t write with a pencil.
Miraculously, he could use a marker.
Whatever works, right? 😉
I was also able to differentiate this center for my struggling readers by telling them to find the word in the sentence that matched the picture (dog, pumpkin, cat, etc.) instead of writing the whole sentence.
I highly recommend this pack and can’t wait for the winter one to come out! I have talked about Christina countless times on my blog and she finally started her own blog! Be sure to follow her . . . You’ll love her!
I am so mad at myself because I forgot to take a picture of my new ELA Intervention Binder.
This pack from Miss DeCarbo is GENIUS. I can’t get over it. I made my binder JUST LIKE MISS DECARBO’s! I was so proud of it that I had to show it to my teammates. They oohed and ahhed and now they both want one too!
Honestly, this pack is saving my life. I have used it every single day.
I have to admit I was very nervous for the first couple of students to use the expo markers on the sheet protectors. That’s a new one for me. I’d never done that before.
So I may have winced a little. And gasped. And possibly yelled, “DON’T PRESS SO HARD! WHY ARE YOU SO ANGRY? LIGHTEN UP, I SAID!”
But it worked. You can actually use an expo marker on a sheet protector and it wipes right off. Who knew? Not me.
MY DESK!!!
IN MY OFFICE!!!
The office isn’t actually ready yet, though. The floor is taped off for painting (gray — coming soon!) and my hubby is working on the baseboards this weekend.
BUT . . . he wanted to do some measuring because he is going to build an extension on the right hand side with shelves and cubby holes for things like construction paper and laminate and copy paper and whatnot.
So the desk is no longer in there. But while it was, I pretended I was in my office and I told my pretend secretary to hold my calls.
My husband was my secretary, but he quickly informed me that no one was calling.
He didn’t understand what I was doing. Men.
The desk is my early Christmas present. Or, it’s my early birthday present.
Or, it’s I WORK HARD AND SO I SPENT THE MONEY I GET FROM WORKING HARD ON A DESK SO I CAN WORK EVEN HARDER.
I have drooled over this desk for over a year. I have visited it at Pottery Barn and online, too. I may have even dreamed about it.
And now here it is.
I mean, just look at it.
Doesn’t it make you want to tell your secretary to hold your calls?
HOLD MY CALLS, I SAID!
😉
Gorgeous office! I am so happy for you and your soon-to-be dream space. Also, I'm definitely going to have to check out the write the room for my first graders (we could always use extra practice remembering how to write a sentence!)
Paige
Paiges of Learning
I love that write the room! Sorry about your sink…glad it all got sorted out..eventually! 🙂
Sarah
teachingiscolorful.blogspot.com
I'm in envy of your soon-to-be-ready office. Mine won't be ready until spring….or early summer (let's hope for spring). I'm glad you discovered dry erase markers on sheet protectors. They have been my best used tool for 3 years now.
Storie
Not sure if your hubby has the whole "extension thing with shelves" all figured out yet or not. I'm also blessed with a crafty husband. Poor guy has created, built, or tweeked way too many things for my classroom and our home over the years. #spoiledwife
But I have an idea for you if your hubby hasn't already thought of it. In our office, the top of my 'desk' is actually a countertop. He gets decorative table legs and cuts them to size to hold up the ends. Whenever he builds the shelves, I get the totes or tubs first and then he builds the openings to fit what I'm going to put in there. All to say, a long countertop is so much easier to clean and it gives one uniform look over the top of the hot mess of shelves underneath. Good luck with whatever the end result is! 🙂
Signed,
The chick who screamed at you in Vegas (still can't believe I did that….wackadoo!)
I'm so excited for the sentence center! woo-hoo! And your kids will do fine with expo markers on page protectors – I do a lot of that to save copies! ha!(our copies are "counted" so we have to watch how much we copy)
ps…. where did you get your desk!?