Bulletin boards

I am posting some of my favorite boards I created this year. As my first year as a teacher and being a late hire, I had to create things quickly with little thought. I hope to put more thought into things next year! I am linking up to Teaching Happily Ever After.http://teachinghappilyeverafter.blogspot.com/2011/06/bulletin-board-ideas-linky-party.html

My Word Chunk Wall (each flag represented a vowel and we listed the word chunks under each flag)

After Weeks of studying the ocean, we read the story The Nonopus. Here is our board to display them:

Another ocean theme set up with a quote from Rainbow Fish. Our kiddos did a retell on each part of the fish. They loved this!

Go check out Teaching Happily Ever After for more board ideas!

http://teachinghappilyeverafter.blogspot.com/2011/06/bulletin-board-ideas-linky-party.html

Little Kicks

(trying out his new "soccerteam" field)

Believe it or not (and I'm still not sure I can) we have signed Cohen up for his first soccer team. Seems a bit early doesn't it! After our good friends, The Pyles, talked us in to joining the 3U team we knew we wanted in. Surely this will teach our spirited child how to work well with others and how to follow directions, right!? We shall see. In the meantime, We are giddy about The Buddy's new adventure and especially his tiny cleats and jersey shirt. Our first practice is this Saturday and the games will start next week. GOOOOOO Tiny Kicks Blue Team!

Votes Needed!

Cohen's new room was featured with 20 others on The Shopping Mamma blog and is now in the running for a gift certificate to Land of Nod!!

Cast Your Vote HERE: http://theshoppingmama.com/2011/02/vote-for-your-favorite-real-reader-room/

Ours is the Vintage Surf Todder Room! Thanks!!

Time Flies

I have been blessed with the task of teaching a great group of spirited six year olds in the next chapter in my life. With that, my life has turned upside down. I truly never, ever fully understood the demands of being a first year teacher until I was in the trenches. Due to this, my precious blog took a waaaay back seat. The night before Cohen's second birthday I received a call from my now principal to join them for an interview the next morning. I had already taken a half day to celebrate The Buddy's birthday at his school, so I was in the clear to make the interview. I never dreamed I would receive a call during his birthday dinner that night offering me the job. I was immediately panicking! I thought I would be elated, overjoyed, ecstatic that all my hard work over the last two years was finally paying off. Sadly I was now 6 measely days from Meet the Teacher night and have an empty classroom. (sigh). I can still feel the anxiety. If it weren't for my Mother, Ceebee, Mother-in-Law, sister and completely supportive husband I could NEVER had made that deadline.

But alas, I did and was catapulted into the craziest Fall I have ever experienced. Here is the Fall in review!!

Cohen's Birthday Dinner (daddy was working )

My first Classroom: BEFORE



AFTER:

Halloween:

THANKSGIVING: 

Spent in O.K at Grandaddy's work

Second Annual Deck the Dolls: 

The Crew

Cousins :o)

Check out last year's Deck the Dolls HERE

CHRISTMAS: 

                                                       Cohen's new ball pit/bounce house!

SNOW DAYS:

Loving the sled from Lala

Making shapes in the snow

Firsts:

First skinned knees :o(

First 3D movie

NEW BEDROOM: Vintage Surf

Whew! That was a quick look at the last 6 months. Cohen is amazing us daily with his vocabulary and abilities. He is a guy that definitely knows exactly what he wants (or doesn't want). His favorite word is "NO" and he currently prefers daddy, but we recently tried our first preschool gymnastics class which is dear to my heart after teaching it for years. He had a lot of fun, but I am not sure he is quite ready for it yet. We will wait a few months and try again.

I hope that you have enjoyed this quick look at our lives the last 6 months and I hope to update on a more regular basis now. Thanks for waiting!









Cohen is sliding down Chutes and climbing the Birthday Ladder

Head to From Pedicures to Puddles to check out all the Birthday Party details! Let me know what you think :o)

The Buddy

Our Little Buddy is turning 2! Our hearts expand daily with the awesome gift from God that is Cohen Eric Nelson. Here are a few things that you should know about our buddy:

• He LOVES to dance. This kid has some rhythm :o) The cutest part of this is that he dances all the time...to any tune. If it is slow he slows it down...if it is fast he speeds it up. I can't wait to see how this fits in to his future. I was known to dance a jig or two in my day and I guess he gets this from me.

• Delays, shmelays...Although Cohen was diagnosed with a 10 month speech delay back in May, he has made leaps and bounds in the verbal department. He is currently enrolled in ECI (early Childhood Intervention) and loves his therapists. We are so pleased with the progress he has made. Our current favorite sayings include: "no, no kenzi" "help...please...I stuck" "whoa" "yehaw" "hi cool" (hi, school) and "I uh ooo" (I love you)

• He has no fear..he loves to climb and loves to slide (thus the Chutes and Ladders theme for his 2nd bday party)
• He is a tough kid...(for memory purposes I am recording this here) Cohen has received 7 (seven!) bites in a matter of 7 (seven!) weeks from other kids at daycare. There is obviously an epidemic of biters (3 culprits so far) running rampent at his school. OTHERWISE he loooooooves going to school and is learning so much. Other than this incident; which I promise you I am dealing with (if you know me you know I am not passive with these kinds of things) we are very pleased with his school.

• He weighs roughly 24 pounds (by our calculations) and is growing like a weed. We should know more at his appt in a couple of weeks.

We had a fabulous weekend celebrating this guy and can't wait to show you all the festivities! As soon as I receive the professional pics back...

A Despicable, Fire Fightin, Roughridin, swimming lesson filled, circus watchin kind of weekend

Whew! What a weekend! Baseball season is still in full swing, so Steven had to work. That meant it was Date Night for the buddy and I! We started off at the movies on Friday night. We saw Despicable Me. We really enjoyed it!

The buddy totally into the movie

The next morning we headed to the Frisco Fire Station for a bday party!

He was ready for cake!

Waiting for our turn in the firetruck!! He was SO excited!

Once we got out of the fire truck he wanted nothing more than to get back in the fire truck! He kept telling us, "Help" and "Stuck"

The tires were bigger than him!

The next stop was Saturday evening. We joined the Pyle's at the Frisco Roughriders game to see daddy!

Cohen's baseball snack of choice: raisons

We then headed to the Circus on Sunday evening! No joke...this was the craziest weekend!

The Elephants were our favorite!

The fabulous world wind weekend ended tonight with The Buddy's first swim lessons. I was nervous because I didn't know what to expect or how Cohen would react.

Practicing jumping in

Popping mommy's "bubble"

He loved swim lessons!! He should sleep well tonight because we are totally pooped!

NOW that has ended we are T minus 5 days until The Buddy's Chutes and Ladders party! We are getting excited, praying for cloud coverage and have looooooots still to do! Hope your week is going well and we will see you with party details next week!!

Thirty-One

No...I didn't have a birthday again...I was introduced to the Thirty-One company this past weekend and wanted to share it with you. I had never seen it before, but you may have. If you have, please let me know your experience because I plan on ordering a few...er....lots of things!

I am always up for a cute new bag and I like all of the options that the catalog has. You can also embroider for only $6! No matter what you have embroidered it is only six bucks! I love it!

I am thinking Back to School bags, diaper bags filled with personalized bibs as gifts AND the flat iron case (only $20!) for Christmas gifts!!

If you're interested in participating in my online party, Click HERE for the Catalog and HERE to shop until August 31st! Don't worry if you don't live near me...I will get it to ya!

Loving this backpack for The Buddy! You can insert anything you like in the clear front packet!

My absolute fav product is their personalized stationary :o)

Happy Shopping!