Reflecting 14 in 14

I am linking up with these fabulous bloggers for 14 in '14! Here is a recap of my year:

This has truly rang true for me in 2014. I trusted God to lead me to where the hubs and I needed to be and he did. He amazes me and overwhelms me with his mercy.

This has to be my cowboy boots! I can't wear them right now since my recent foot surgery and I am soooooo SAD!!!!

This is my all time favorite Christmas movie/movie in general. The hubs and I can almost quote the entire movie. We love it. 

 "Are you serious, Clark?"-Cousin Eddie------:)

I must admit that I have been completely engrossed in this show. I guess my love of country music is the main cause. :)))

I have two restaurants that I rave over. Of course we are avid Alabama football (or Alabama anything) lovers and we travel to Tuscaloosa quite often. These two restaurants are two of my favorites. Baumhowers Wings is owned by Bob Baumhower who is a former Crimson Tide standout. It is adorned with Crimson Tide memorabilia everywhere and is where you can usually see some players eating. 

The City Cafe is a dainty little (and I do mean little)restaurant that the hubs introduced me to. It was one of my Granddaddy Billy's favorite places to eat. We would go with him almost everytime we met him in T-town. They serve home cooked meals such as catfish, fried chicken, and all the fixings. You can tell we like to eat. LOL!

I would have never told you a year ago that I would be teaching in my hometown and I sure would not have told you I would be teaching Kindergarten. I sure do feel blessed that I could have this opportunity and I am in love with this age level.

I LOVE Kindergarten!!!!!

TIME!!! Definitely the chance to be back home in my hometown, teaching at the school in which I graduated from, and my husband teaching right across the road from me. The TIME in which God arranged everything in our favor. He deserves all the credit for this!!!

I have like a million pins. I can't pick just one. I have pinned tons of stuff to help me with the transition to kindergarten and also just for life.  Go check out my Pinterest boards.

Since I am new to blogging myself, I love to look at other teachers blogs. I love to read the posts in the summer on Monday Made It on Tara's Fourth Grade Frolics website. Check it out this summer. You will find all kinds of creative ideas.

Learning to trust in the LORD for all things and for learning some valuable life lessons. He placed me right where I needed to be.--Haleyville Elementary School

I love him with all my heart!! He makes me smile, laugh, and see the positive side of things every single day. I look forward to many more years with my sweet hubby!

My favorite memory would have to be getting these two sweet little pups. They have brought so much joy to our lives and are truly man's best friend. Yorkie Lovers!

Gabe and Gabby

I want to be better at working out and lifting weights. I have tried this in the past and never stuck with it. I want to make a life change rather than just be on a diet.

TRUST

I posted this in March or April on my Instagram and I had prayed that same prayer for years. I am living proof that he hears your prayers.  He just does things in HIS time, NOT ours.

2014 was fabulous!!! I look forward to an even better 2015!! ROLL TIDE!!

Here's to 2015! Love and Prayers!

Elaine

Better Late than Never--RIGHT?

I completely apologize for the delay in posting. I can truly say that the hustle and bustle of the holidays and surgery on my foot (YIKES!) has truly taken a toll on my posting. I know you are at home enjoying your Christmas/winter break but I still wanted to share what went down in my Kindergarten classroom in the month of December. Hang on this post is photo overloaded!!!

 Here are just a few of the super cute and super easy crafts that we made!!! All Pinterest inspired, of course!!!

 I read the book Santa's Stuck and we did this super cute writing craftivity to go along with it.

 I took my kiddos picture with them spelling out Merry Christmas! I printed them out and placed them inside a Christmas card and wrote each kid a note as a gift from me.

 We made this super cute snowman buckets out of cans from our lunchroom. We painted them and placed all their ornaments in them that the students made. It made it so easy for them to get home with the ornaments without breaking them. :)

Grinch Day

 My Grinch shirt purchased from Amazon. Only pic I got that day~~~~:(

 My sweet co-worker's daughter drew this anchor chart for me. Thank you Reagan!!! I appreciate your help. My sweet co-worker came up with all the Grinch ideas. I can't take credit for any of them. This a tradition she has done in her classroom for many years. I just joined in on the fun this year.

 We made the Grinch's hat with Bugles and red and green M&M's with white chocolate. Not only were they yummy but they were super cute!

Reindeer Unit

 We made this super cute reindeer craft out of paper plates. I LOVE crafts that are easy and super cute! We painted the plate with brown paint. We cute the plates in half and then added the students handprints as the antlers.(Clothes line they are hanging on is from Dollar General--They had Christmas trees, snowflakes, and several others--LOVE). We talked about reindeer and learned lots of cool facts.

 According to my class, they would rather be a reindeer and fly rather than be an elf and work. LOL!

POLAR EXPRESS DAY

Students were able to wear pajamas and we sat our chairs in the hallway in a replica of the train on the movie. Christmas music played as the students arrived to school via the intercom, which I thought gave it a festive feel. I was just as excited as the students were. This was my first Polar Express day at my new school and I have to say that it completely was a BLAST! Our principal read the book to them and we ate cookies and milk. Then we returned to our room to watch the movie and enjoy some yummy hot cocoa. I made my hot cocoa in the crockpot. I definitely will be doing that again. It was so much easier and much, much quicker.

 Classroom Christmas Party

 I'm not sure of where to even start in describing our Christmas party. All I can say is, my parents were phenomenal. They helped in every single aspect of this party. I truly felt completely blessed! I tell you people----this was AMAZING!!! Two of my parents printed a Christmas BINGO game. We read a book and if they book mentioned any of the pictures on the card then they placed a shape on the picture. We used all kinds of Christmas books to make sure we included as many of the pictures on the BINGO card as we could.

 Two parents let the children make reindeer food and put this super cute tag on it. The kids loved it!!!

 I think my students know me. The Yorkie tag made the gift even more special!!

 I also received some of the cutest and most thoughtful gifts from some of my kiddos. Glittered clothespins---Be jealous---!!!! Thank you to all the parents and guardians who helped to make this party a GREAT success!!! You will never know how much you mean to me!!

Now, I am trying to recover from a foot surgery that I had last Monday. It has been 6 days of painful sitting. I am not a sitter. I am definitely a mover and shaker. LOL! I don't do well sitting still and keeping my foot elevated. I go back to the Dr. on Tuesday and hopefully he will change the bandage and give me great news. Please keep me in your prayers!!!

I hope you had a fabulous Christmas and are getting ready to ring in the New Year with friends and family. 

Wishing you a Happy New Year and of course ROLL TIDE!!!

Elaine Frix

Comet has ARRIVED!!!!

Our Elf arrived the day before we got out for Thanksgiving break. My co-worker and I made a HUGE ordeal about it. Seriously don't know how I would have ever made it without her. She has literally helped me more than she will ever know.

We had the office contact us that we had had a package delivered and we needed to pick it up right away. We left the lunchroom and went by the office and picked the super cold packages up. We had left the packages in the refrigerator all morning so they would be super cold upon arriving. Hehe!!!! By this time, the classroom is WILD and I do mean WILD!!!! They couldn't hold it in any longer. Inside the package was our letter from Santa, a treat for the students (candy canes that had a note attached to it), and a Naughty and Nice list. I forgot to take a pic (amid the excitement and WILD chaos of the event).  As I was reading the letter, the students could barely hold it in.  They screamed and couldn't wait to see where our elf was. He also had been in the refrigerator and was super cold. He was right on top of our Smartboard watching all the boys and girls.

Now it was time to name our elf.  I was really hoping for someone to come up with a fun name or something really cool.  Here’s what the kids chose and then voted on…

I got this great bubble map idea from Cheryl at Primary Grafitti.  Love.  Take a look at those names. Comet won!!!

After we named him, we filled out one of the printables from Cara Carroll's Classroom Elf Freebie so that the kids would have something to take home to share with their parents about our classroom elf.

We began writing in our little elf writing journals immediately after returning from PE. They love doing this. I got them started the first five days and taught them how to look on the word wall for sight words or words they might have trouble spelling. We are slowly but surely becoming much better writers. After the fifth day, I let them do it independently. I was pleasantly surprised at how well they did all own their own. Their innocence is precious!!! 



We downloaded all the Elfis Freebies from The First Grade Parade. Cara Carroll did a great job on preparing this FREEBIE!!!! I am telling you that her blog has saved me from many mini meltdowns this year. Big PUFFY heart love her! I hope I get the opportunity to meet her one day.

Gotta run! I am wiped out!!! Hope to share some of the fun ornaments and crafts we have been doing soon. Happy Wednesday, sweet friends!

Long time---NO see!!!

Sorry for the delay in posting. Changing schools and grade levels has overtaken me and proven that I really needed the change more than I ever knew. Isn't it amazing that the Lord knows what we need before we even know it?? HE truly is AMAZING! I praise him daily for allowing my husband and I the opportunity to grow and learn in this new environment.

We are busily working on decorating our halls for Christmas. We will be having a Polar Express ride in a few weeks. I will attempt to post pics of the activities as we do them. I am not going to promise anything.

I wanted to post some of the Christmas ideas I've used in the past.

 We made the grinch face. On the mouth I attached a saying that said, "To make the Grinch smile I would.....". I got this idea from my mom (who also teaches K). I am not sure of where she got the original idea.

 This santa was a Pinterest find. I gave my 3rd graders (last year) the paper and allowed them to cute the body and legs. I already had precut the head and feet. Super cute and super easy. This craft took some time, even for 3rd graders. I haven't decided if I will attempt this with K though! :)

 We read the story The Puppy Who Wanted a Boy and did this cute craftivity to accompany it. I got this idea from Amy Lemons-Christmas Craze! Unit. It is great to review the beginning, middle and end of books.

 We created a Techy Santa. We wrote on our make believe iPads what we wanted for Christmas. This came from Reagan Tunstall's Techy Santa unit. I love her stuff. It is creative and cute but has tons of meaning behind it. I love crafts that have meaning behind it.

 This was my door last year at my previous school for deck the halls. Super easy!! I gave each child an ornament printed on cardstock and allowed them to use magazine clippings, scrapbook paper, etc to decorate their ornament however they wanted. Turned out to be very unique! Got the ornament idea from First Grade Blue Skies.

This was created by the 2nd and 3rd grade students last year. We painted handprints green and made them into a Christmas tree.

I just thought I would share some things I have done in the past, to try to help me get into the Christmas spirit in my classroom. I have my tree up at home. SCORE!!!! I am working on getting everything in place to post pics. I LOVE Christmas and decorating but I HATE taking it down. Can I get an AMEN? Hope you have a fantabulous week! Of course I have to add a huge ROLL TIDE ROLL!!!! Sorry not sorry!

Behavior Calendars--SALE!!!

Who is ready for fall????? ME!!!!!! I love fall!! Mainly because that means it is time for FOOTBALL!!!! I love to watch the TIDE ROLL!! I have been busily working in my room trying to keep my head above water. Moving grades and schools can rock a "wanna be" organized gal's world. Just saying! LOL! I am still looking for and finding things that I lost in the move to my new school. Slowly I will locate my MIA items. One of the items I lost was my behavior calendars I have used for years. Guess that mean I just needed new ones!!!

I have created behavior calendars for October-July. A behavior calendar provides great communication between you and parents about behavior. It allows you to share the action the child took without having to write a note to the parent. I also add my colors that correlate with my behavior clip chart so that the parents can see what color their child was on that particular day. It gives students ownership of their behavior when they are the ones coloring the calendar instead of you. I am placing these on sale for this week!!! Go get them now--because everyone loves a SALE! I hope you find these helpful. 

Blessings,
Elaine

Lacey Walker the Nonstop Talker Craftivity

We are in week five of kindergarten and I am loving it more every single day!!! Now are there days I am about to pull my hair at the end of the day...of course. However, this is the most rewarding grade I've ever taught. 

We have really been working on rules and routines and we read the book Lacey Walker the Nonstop Talker. 

We talked about being a good listener. I got the activity idea 

from The First Grade Parade. 

I created the anchor chart with sticky notes that will help me be able to reuse it next year. :) We brainstormed ways to be a good listener.  We did a little teacher directed activity where the kids got to put together a little sentence and create their own little Lacey Walkers created from construction paper and old scrapbook paper.  It was tough having to listen to and follow directions…  The labels at the top are the students names. I print them off and use them on several crafts at the beginning of the year when the students can't quite write their names yet. I also got this idea from Cara Carroll at The First Grade Parade.

Whew!  It’s definitely been a BUSY week and I.AM.WIPED. 

Hope y’all are having a GREAT week!!!

Behavior Calendar and My Name is FREEBIES!!!!

Well, I have survived the "until Labor day" with Kindergarten. To say that I love it is an absolute understatement. I love my new school and co-workers! God truly does work everything to the good to those who love him! I posted a couple of freebies on TPT this weekend.

I posted a behavior calendar that I'm using to help students have ownership of their behavior/actions. I am trying to really reiterate the fact that we need to make good choices. I allow the students to color the color that their magnet lands on that day.

You can download it HERE.

We are also working on writing and recognizing our name. I downloaded the My Name Has.... This document allows students to see how many letters are in their name.

You can download it HERE.

The first few weeks have gone very smoothly. May you enjoy your Labor Day weekend!

Blessings,

Elaine