Scary Storms and Praying for OK

Well, I left school yesterday feeling good and thinking I can't wait to share some the silly things my kids do. That all changed when I got home and saw the news....

My heart has been so heavy for these poor families. About a year ago a tornado come through our small Royse City town and destroyed a few homes. Although it was awful it does not compare to the disaster in Moore BUT I remember just how much it affected everyone in our town. Everyone knew someone that was affected and it was a scary time as parents were racing to the school to check out their children and decisions were being made whether or not we should take cover. I, in no way, can understand what these families in Moore are going through but I've tried to put my thoughts, feelings, and heart in their situation.

One of our local boutiques (my favorite) is selling these t-shirts. 100% of the net profits will benefit the victims and families of Moore. You can order @ iShopLaRue.com.

I know that if we all do something small it will make a BIG difference.

As for our little town, we once again found ourselves today facing bad weather. By 2:00 I only had 2 children left and at 3 the entire school was placed into 2 rooms, our music room and a classroom. It was hot, scary, and you could occasionally hear sobs from some of the kids. It was hard to tell where they were coming from because they all had their head down and covered. At one point, there was a little boy that lifted up to his knees, put his hands at his chin, closed his eyes, and began praying. Bless their baby hearts!! By 4:30, we were released and the buses started heading to schools. The last kids were loaded and all the teachers were able to go home by 5:30.

My little sweet informed me today that she was glad that we lived in the back of our addition. When I asked her why, she said because the tornadoes might not make it to us. As if they start at the entrance of housing additions and work their way back. Poor thing, these horrible storms truly are hard to understand.

 

Hug your family tonight!

 

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Mother's Day and a Recap of Last Week

Today was an AMAZING day. I LOVE my sweet family so much and they made today EXTRA special for me. I woke up to a very yummy breakfast in bed and then off to church. We were on time today {this is special}. A fabulous lunch, laying out by the pool, family game of four square, and sitting around outside talking and laughing.

Look at my super cute and super fast looking shoes. I had picked these up once and said I liked them and my WONDERFUL husband surprised me with these this weekend. I cannot wait to try them out at 5:30 am.

Oh what a crazy week I had last week. I am looking forward to a more productive and less crazy this week. I think I was completely exhausted and my mind was in a million places. Not that this week won't be busy, maybe I'll just have a better grip on it. So, you say "How exhausted were you?" Well, so tired that I got out of my car at work this week (7:15) and left it running ALL day....(I even attended a house warming party for a coworker in the library after school) Around 4:45 I decided to head home and my truck was stilling running waiting for me to drive it back home. Ummm....I didn't even leave the AC on to have it nice and cool for myself at the end of the day.?! What was I thinking? My sweet husband thought we should make a sign that says "Free to a Good Home" to put on the windows. {sheesh}

We were busy getting ready for our Ma Spa . So exciting....and the kids worked hard to make it special for their mom. This is a special way for the them to show their mommies how important they are to them. I'm so thankful to LessonPlansSOS for their fun idea. We had planned to host this in our cafeteria this year rather than our classrooms to help out some coworkers who were going to be at a training most of the week. On Thursday, we found out that it could not be done in the cafeteria, we would need to host it in the gym. We moved 15 cafeteria tables to the gym an hour and a half before mommas showed up. Whew!! I get tired just thinking about it. We had close to 90 moms attend our spa. I loved watching the kids pamper their moms.

I let the kids practice painting my nails before they did it for their moms. Some of their little hands were shaking from trying to steady themselves.

We made Advice books for mom to read while she enjoyed refreshments. I snapped a few pics of some while they were working but I don't have pics of the final product.......yet.

While trying to get the final touches on this, we were learning about capacity. I can't think of a better way than to play in water.

Yes, it was fun. Yes, it was messy. Yes, only 1 student actually poured water over their tub like I asked. {sigh} I think we went through 2 paper towel rolls. Some children were swimming in their seats. But they learned a lot and were quickly able to understand that 2 cups equals a pint, 2 pints equal a quart, and so on....

Well, that was a recap of last week. Happy Mother's Day to all the mommas out there!! Especially my momma, wish I was closer to share it with her.

 

Sweet Dreams!

 

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Mother's Day Trash to Treasure

There is nothing more exciting than to finally decide on a gift from your kids to their mommas EXCEPT when it doesn't break the bank. WOOHOO!! That makes me happy. Yes, this truly is a trash to treasure gift.

This is what I LOVE about my husband. He doesn't question me when I say to him "please don't throw {insert any item} away, I need them for school". He just starts a little pile for me until I have enough. So, my newest trash item was Kcups. By the way, I {heart} my Keurig. I think they are the cutest things. They look just like planters, plus I was curious to see the inside of one. I opened them up, cleaned them out, and then spray painted them. Perfect!!

The kids made a heart with their thumbprints and we planted flowers in them. As a momma, I LOVE pictures of my kids, so I decided to add a picture.

I added a clothespin to the back of the Kcups and the kids wrote You Are My Sunshine around the sunshine {diecut}, I added their sweet face to the middle.

Tada!! The only other thing the kids will do is add a poem to the clothespin. We are working on poems this week....and fingers crossed all their seeds will have sprouted by Friday. We only have a few sprouts right now.

Speaking of sprouts, today was flower day for Teacher Appreciation Week. I love to see the kids coming in with flowers, they look so sweet {the kids}. Some of the flowers look as though they were picked straight from their neighbors garden while they were waiting for the bus. LOVE!!!

 

 

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My Favorite {Area}!

Area! Area! Area! We just finished area. I actually enjoy teaching this to the kids and they really seem to enjoy it too. We spent last week creating and some recreating their bedrooms and figuring out the area. They LOVED this and I was really impressed with their creativity.

After they made their furniture and decorated it, they had to find the area of each piece. We went on an area scavenger hunt and created our own area pictures. {Click here} if this is something that you could use.

 

I try to start each day with a different way to greet each and say good morning. Here's a picture of our ET greeting

and our good morning ankle shakes...

This helps us get our days started off on the right foot. (haha!!.......get it???!!!!)

Have a sweet Monday friends!!

 

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Kids and The Funny Things They Say

I have to admit I'm loving the instagram with other teachers. I LOVE the pics and brief little comments are perfect for me. I tend to overanalyze what I am trying to say. I think worry to much about how it sounds. Silly?! I know. That's just how I roll. That's why short and sweet is good for me. <--geez, maybe I'm a poet and didn't know it (hahaha.....okay, I'll stop)

Really, I'm just blogging to share the funny things that kids say. They seriously make me laugh out loud all the time. My sweet husband always asks me after I finish telling him a classroom story, did you write that down?? You would have a bestseller and you will want to read that when you retire. {sigh} No, I didn't write it down because I'm too busy keeping notes on so many other things but I KNOW I'm going to wish I had. Maybe this is the start of it......

I have a student who's mother is pregnant with her fourth child and due any day. I think she may be at that miserable stage in her pregnancy. She subs a lot at my school and I had their oldest child in class. This family is very special to me.

Me: Good morning, A! How's your momma doing? Is your new little sister here yet?

A: She's good. No, she hasn't had the baby yet but they are going to self born it tomorrow.

Me: Self born it?

A: Yes, the doctor will have to born it for her because she is taking too long.

Me: Oh, I see.

I love this!! It makes me laugh everytime I think about it.

This next sweet kid tells me stories ALL THE TIME. I'm not sure what is true and what is not true. He is always so serious.

D: Mrs. Kirby, what are the words in my voice?

Me {what in the world???}: Excuse me?

D: You know the words in my voice.

{actually, I have no idea - but this is where balloons and winner bells/alarms should go off}

Me: English??

D: Yea, that's it. I'm writing in my journal about when I lived in Mexico and my dad taught me to have English in my voice.

Me: Oh, I see.

Ya'll, this child has never been to Mexico and his mom informed me that she doesn't know what he is talking about. I love this kid!!

Okay, last one. The past few days we have been observing mealworms and doing different science investigations with them.

We observed the mealworms to see if they preferred black or white paper. The mealworms kept going to the black paper.

Me: Why do you think they might prefer the black paper?

{random student that blurted out without raising their hand}: Probably because their mom and dad are black.

Me: Oh, I see.

Ummm, okay what do I say. :)

I will leave you with this fun picture of my class working in the hallway...........

not because I'm fun and cool like that but because we had a puker first thing in the morning and it was a little stinky in there.

Sweet dreams!

 

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See You Tuesday......@ Instagram

Well, of course, I'm joining the Instagram craze. I love pictures!! Sad fact though, I can't actually take a good pic, so the filters in Instagram are what I fell in LOVE with when I first joined.

I'm super excited about this because I LOVE pictures the most. Some of my favorite blogs, the ones that I stalk follow share LOTS of pictures. So just the thought of all the teachers out there sharing pictures on Tuesday.........EEEEKKKK! ----makes me nerdy excited. hehe!

You can find me

@sweetnsassyin2nd

Let me know how I can find you in the comments.

 

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Something Old to Something New and FREE

After STAAR testing this week I was going through a Really Good Stuff magazine (I think I dog eared almost all the pages) and found a math game that looks very similar to an old game we have at home in our game closet.  So I started thinking, this looks really fun......I don't have any extra money...how can I make this game???  This is what I came up with and the kids LOVED it!  So, I'm sharing this with you and I hope your kids LOVE it too.

Old Game

New Game

You can download the game {here}.  We have played this with our hundreds board so they understood that they could only use math vocabulary to ask questions.  

Okay, I'm a little all over the place right now but I'm LOVIN' Saturday...it was a beautiful day.  We started our weekend with my big Sass' last high school baseball game for his sophomore year (time is going too fast).  <---yes, just high school, he will begin his summer baseball soon...plenty more baseball to come.

Then my sweet little Sass started our Saturday with some softball. 

OH!OH!OH........And guess what my LOVE got me for our anniversary????  

A new ipad!!  I am super excited.  Yea, our anny is in June.  He said that he couldn't wait to give it to me and I'm okay with that.:)  Now, what apps should I get??? 

Sweet Dreams!!