Five for Friday 1.4

I love getting to spend my Fridays reviewing the week with this fun linky party! Here is my week in review! 

1. The week started off very relaxing with a day off on Monday. I spent my weekend doing absolutely nothing but catching up on some much needed rest and some movies! RedBox is the best invention for movie lovers everywhere!

2. I got an order for 2 of my crosses for a lady who is having twin girls this week! Twice the fun! Here is the beginning stages of one of them. You can check out my other crosses here!

3. My week started off nice and relaxing but honestly after Monday it was a long and stressful week with a few frustrations. So I took out my frustrations with crafting, baking, and the gym. Here are the yummy cupcakes I made for the 100th day of school! Someone asked me if I put 100 sprinkles on each one, and boy do I wish I would have thought about that; however, I resorted to the simple task for just rolling the cupcake in a bowl of sprinkles! 

4. Have I mentioned that I LOVE teaching math? because it's my favorite. On Wednesday, we made these fun counting mats for counting our 100 things. My kids brought in some interesting things for the 100th day. We had marshmallows, lemon drops, pasta shells, gum balls, and silly bands! However, the most popular counter choice was pennies! The 100th day was fun, we took 100 steps, and counted 100 things, then we rolled dice to 100 and ended it with graphing 100 things!

5. In February I am working on a Christian retreat for young adult girls and the workers give out agape to the girls so this week I decided to make some. Agape means love and there is nothing better than God's love for us. I found a great deal on highlighters from Office Max and thought they were a great reminder of how God is the HIGHLIGHT of our day! 

"You are my lamp, O Lord; the Lord turns 

my darkness into light." 

2 Samuel 22:29

~ Rachel 

Five for Friday 1.3

Happy Friday to all! We are back again for another addition of Kacey's Five for Friday. 

1. The week started with my Sunday School class going out to eat at a fun local restaurant. After lunch, a group of us played a game of Ultimate Frisbee which I don't think I have played since high school. I spent the next two days paying for it with sore legs and ankles but it was such a fun way to hang out with friends. I am currently working on learning to catch the frisbee, let's just say I was a much better defensive player.

2. On Monday, I trekked through the rain to see David Platt at Lakeview. He is amazing,  so challenging and inspiring. I loved his book Radical and I'm excited to read his new one coming out soon! I first read Radical before traveling abroad and this quote held true when I returned from the Philippines. 

"Orphans are easier to ignore before you know their names. They are easier to ignore before you see their faces. It is easier to pretend they’re not real before you hold them in your arms. But once you do, everything changes…” 

If you are looking for a great cause, let me know! I know 36 precious children that changed my life.

3. We are learning place value and making numbers using tens and ones this week in Math. I have all these great tens and ones cubes but no great games to play with them so I decided to put on my own thinking cap and come up with a game during the five minutes I have for lunch. Teaching on the fly as I call it. 

 How to play: we used our AMSTI investigation cards and split the deck in half. Turn over one of each card and create the number shown. Above is 86: 8 tens and 6 ones
Below: 102, 10 tens and 2 ones. My kids loved this game and get excited every time I give it as a game option.

4. I love my nativity that I got in Manila and a few weeks ago I found this great stable to go with it! Best part: it was 75% off!!! Music to my ears. It is made of drift wood and fits perfectly with my other pieces. I very sadly took all of my Christmas decorations down the first week of January but decided not to take this great nativity down. I believe nativities should be left up all year long! What a great reminder each morning to live for Christ. 

5. We have also been talking about Martin Luther King this week since we will be out of school on Monday. I love teaching first grade because they are so loving and innocent. I began reading a great book I got in a Scholastic book pack and my kids stopped me half way through and asked " Why were they doing that, that's rude." 

I hope everyone has a great weekend! 

~Rachel 

Five for Friday 1.2

Well we made it!!! My goodness it was a long week, at least for me it was. It was the first full week back and report cards needed to be finished and I got a new student so BUSY seems like an understatement. 

Here we go. Linking up with Doodle Bugs again! 

1. I spent my weekend crafting away. Check it out here for the whole story, but I have to say I love it!! It is a great craft table, foot proper, book holder, etc.

2. I have started using this book to help guide me through my Bible reading. It is going in chronological order which I am loving! It is a great way to end my days.  

3. Last week was my first week back in Auburn since the Christmas holiday and I was enjoying the time away from ... the GYM. However, I am determined to make my membership worth it this year and so I jumped back into my 4 day a week routine. Let me just mention...that my legs are JELLO after today. But with the weather already feeling like summer I am excited about getting toned. 

4. For Christmas I got a really neat gift from my sister. III and LB gave me a beautiful bracelet but the greatest part was the story behind it. It came from Noonday Collection, which is a website that sells jewelry and accessories that are made in 3rd world countries. My bracelet came from Uganda, where LB and III traveled this past summer. Check out more details here! I loved my jewelry and hope you do too! 

5. School stories: This week, as mentioned above has been a dousy, here are some comments that have kept me laughing.

GK: Miss A, you know what I did last night?...swallowed a button!(huge smile) WHAT!!!

- I was told I looked older than a child's mother, made me start thinking I need to get into bed earlier.

Honesty: RS was drawing herself and her mom and talking to her self: "My mommas head is way bigger than mine.....Opps, her legs are not little." (They will say anything)

~Rachel

Coffee Table Debut

So I have lived in my little humble abode/townhouse for 528 days and went 524 days without a coffee table. When I first moved in I really wanted to go find one at a vintage shop or thrift store and then refinish it but well it took a while for this idea to come to fruition. Finally this past weekend I had had enough of sitting all my stuff on the floor in front of the couch. Trying to find places to finish crafts and such. After a fun lunch with a friend I headed out to the local thrift shop. You see I have been here before and for the past year and a half I have always walked through the furniture section searching for a table I might like, and until this past Saturday I hadn't found one in the 'ole teacher budget. (Has anyone noticed that prices at thrift stores have been on the rise?)

Anyway, I found this beauty there and thought for $14.98 even if change my mind in six months, it's a steal! So the with the help of a worker there we loaded it into the back seat of my car and away I went with a Saturday afternoon project.

The scalloped siding matches some of my other furniture so I thought it was a good fit. However, we had an issue. One of the railings was missing, which wasn't too upsetting because I feel like it would look more like a dinner tray with two railings than a coffee table haha. 

So the demo began, boy would my daddy be proud. I pulled out the sandpaper, hammer, screwdriver and even the wood filler to fill in the holes.

I started with the hammer and pried off the broken side and then realized; it was screwed in. So to prevent any damage I unscrewed the other side and began the long and tedious process of sanding. Sanding led to paint and paint led to a second coat. I still need to seal it so I can place glasses and such on it but what do you think??

I have LOVED having it this past week and as you can see I already have books placed all over it! 

Happy Friday!!! Check back in tomorrow for Five for Friday!

~Rachel 

Five for Friday!

Love this idea for a recap of my week! Linking up with Doodle Bugs Teaching, a fabulous website for teachers!

1. I got to spend the weekend with some awesome family members. My dad's whole side(25 of us minus 2) came to spend Christmas in AL so the 3rd generation decided to create a family tree for our gift to my Grandmomma. We used all of our 'pinky' prints to make the leaves. I think it was a hit! What do you think?

2. I headed back to Auburn on Monday and got to spend the evening with some great friends from my Sunday School class. We played Mexican Train Dominos and had a blast. It's becoming one of my new favorite games!

3. I got my new planner(from Target)! Have I mentioned that I love getting a new planner and adding all of the birthdays in and special events?Because I do! I already have one wedding in there as well as all the birthdays!  My mom has had this one hidden in her Santa stash since October and I have waited very patiently to use it!

 4. I spent the day before work started strolling the aisles of Hobby Lobby and Home Depot and crafted this fun string and nail art cross! Check out my Etsy shop!

5. A funny school story!

The kids came back to school yesterday and we had a very fun day. Today we were having our Morning meeting and one little girl told me that for Christmas she got a BB gun. I casually asked "Oh, is it a Red Rider BB Gun?" She replied yes and two of my little boys almost in unison said:

"You'll shoot your eye out!" 

Ha! I love it, my firsties know A Christmas Story. 

Happy Friday!

~Rachel 

Starting the year right!

Happy New Year to all! I hope everyone had a joyous holiday season, sadly our break is over, well at least for me it is. Meetings all day yesterday and the kiddos rolled into my room at 7:15 this morning! We had a great day and are very excited about tomorrow as we welcome a new student into room A9!

I can not wait to see what this new year has in store! Here are the siblings and myself as we celebrated Christmas and the birth of the greatest gift we've been given!

We are a pretty fun group if I say so myself!

The holidays were a great time to relax and spend quality time with the fam. I returned to Auburn to celebrate the New Year with some fun friends and then went from snoozing in in the mornings to back to 5:30 wake up calls; but I have to admit I missed the kiddos! 

Here is a photo from our Polar Express PJ day! I let them take off their shoes for the whole day and they loved it. One of my friends FJ said "Ahh, now this is the life!" Funny how the little things are huge to them!

  
I had one day in Auburn before the meetings commenced for professional development so I searched Pinterest for a project! I found this on a friends board and knew I wanted to recreate. I chose a cross instead of a heart but here are some photos of the project!

Check it out in the Etsy shop soon! 

Hope you all have a great start back into the work week. 

~Rachel