Well, hello there.

Now that I've had a little "me" time to recuperate from the 2012-2013, I'm a whopping TWO WEEKS from the new school year! Umm, I don't know what your thoughts are on this, but I'm not ok with it. The first day back for teachers is August 12th, our Open House is the 13th (which completely blows my mind!), and the kids start on the 14th.

So I'm sure that if you've been a long time reader of my blog, you're probably thinking that I've already been working on new supplies, and that I've probably already spent hours in my classroom. I mean, come on, who doesn't love getting back in there and setting up for a new year?!

Yeah, not me. I haven't set foot in our building since the last day of school.

Don't get me wrong, I am excited about a new school year. My mind is trying to forget the troubles from last year and is trying to convince me that this year will be the best yet. And, you know, it might be. But after last year...well...let's just say I'm a little guarded.

I did finally start back-to-school shopping today. FYI-Amazon credit cards are pretty much the best thing ever. You see, my hubby and I use our credit card for pretty much everything, and then we simply pay it off at the end of the month. And you get credit on Amazon. So this girl just got $128 worth of supplies for the school year, and I only paid a whopping $19 out of pocket. Bam.

And then, since I was so financially responsible in getting supplies for free, I got to buy fun stuff with my back-to-school budget. Two new bungee chairs from Target, a new fuzzy body pillow, a bean bag, and a 3-piece zebra print rug set. Hello, comfy reading spots.

I am pretty disappointed about our Open House being the day before school starts. On one hand, I love the idea. I think it's pretty great that we'll have the chance to meet parents before school starts. But, on the other hand, I have a lot to get done in addition to planning for an Open House.

Plus, I had this brilliant idea at the end of the school year. You see, last year's class was...a handful. There was very little that they responded to in terms of rewards or consequences and it made my job super difficult. I even went as far as to tear down my classroom. Twice. They lost all of the fun stuff. Not that it mattered to them.

So my plan for this year was to start with a bare-bones classroom and then let them earn all of the fun extras. The chairs, the pillows, the lamps, etc. You know, thinking that if they had to earn it, maybe they would take more ownership.

But come on. There is no way that I'm going to have parents attending an Open House and not have my room set up. So there goes that brilliant idea. Drat.

I'll keep you posted(ish) on that whole "classroom setup" thing. Fingers crossed.

Other life updates:

-My photography business has really been picking up speed. It has been super exciting this summer, and I feel like I've learned more in the last 2 months than I did in the first 4 years.

-I've discovered maxi dresses. Where have you been all my life?!

-The Mr. and I went to Gatlinburg over the 4th of July for vacation. I was an idiot and wore flip flops in the rain. And fell on a sidewalk in front of a bunch of people. And then I fell again about an hour later. Down a flight of stairs. And broke my elbow. And spent most of the 4th of July in the emergency room. Oops.

-In case you missed my last post, I'm teaching 5th grade this year. I was holding out hope that our 6th grade numbers would increase over the summer, but no such luck. On the upside, it looks like I'm going to have a pretty small class.

-I found out over the summer that our amazing technology coach managed to pull a few strings for the coming year. My (now former) grade level partner and I will each have a set of 20 1st-generation iPads to use in our classrooms. I must say that I'm pretty excited about that.

-Probably one of the most important moments of the summer was when we found this bad boy. We finally have a trash can that Charlie can't get into. I can't tell you how awesome it is to not have to hide our trash can in the bathroom every time we leave the house. The refrigerator is another story. We're still resorting to a bungee cord and baby gate for that one.

And lastly, thank you to all of you who left encouraging comments on my last post. I may not have replied, but know that I truly appreciated the support and words of encouragement. I still stand by the fact that I have learned so much more from the blogging community and my own teaching experience than I ever learned in college. I am amazed at the fact that despite my completely sporadic posts over the course of the last year, that my list of followers has continued to grow.

You guys are awesome.

Isn't summer supposed to be relaxing?!

Holy moly.

I've been sooo busy this week!

Ok, maybe not THAT busy, but in terms if this teacher's summer vacation, I was running myself ragged.

Monday and Tuesday were spent at school with my 6th grade partner in crime. (I'm relatively certain she is blog stalking me this summer. Hi Teri!) We spent two full days working out details of our brand new Student Ambassador program

What is the Student Ambassador Program, you ask?

Excellent question.

We're still not entirely sure.

It's at least going to be a combination of safety patrol, student council, PBIS training buddies for new students, peer mentoring/tutoring, school store running (Oh, yeah-we're also starting a school store next year. No biggie.), school event assisting, and probably some other stuff that I'm forgetting.

Easy peasie.

Not.

I'm really excited about starting this next year, but I'd be lying if I said that there isn't a teeny tiny part of me that wonders if we've bit off more than we can chew.

But clearly we both have superhuman abilities (I mean, I pried myself out of bed two mornings in a row during the summer-that HAS to be a super power!), so this should be a cake walk.

Please remind me of that if I have a mid-year meltdown. (Not that that would ever happen.)

I was supposed to meet with my kiddos on Wednesday and Thursday. Due to some scheduling conflicts, it didn't work out to meet with either of them this week. Honestly, as much as I love them, it was nice to have a mini-break (I know, I know, it's summer and I really don't have THAT much going on).

So instead of tutoring and whatnot, I did some antiquing with my mom and sister Wednesday afternoon. And then we made a trip to PetSmart because my sister's 200 6 hamsters needed more bedding.

Ummm...we may have left PetSmart with more than just hamster bedding.

Soooo....my sister has been trying to talk me into getting a class pet since I moved into my classroom. And I've been putting it off because I've just had soo many kids in my room with above average volume levels.

But as of right now, our class sizes are looking pretty small for next year. (WOOT!)

And well, there was this gerbil...

Clearly, you can see where this story is headed, so without further ado, I'd like to introduce you to Walter.

Walter, meet my blogging amigos. Blogging amigos, meet Walter.


Ok, come on now, you can't blame me for not wanting to leave that cute little face in the pet store.

And teacher that had my classroom before me had rats. At least I didn't get a rat, right? Those naked tails creep me out. Walter's tail is completely covered in fur. No bald spots.

He just moved out of his temporary home yesterday into his new gerbil condo. No more spare wire hamster cage for him, no sir.

He's living large, now.



By the way, those tubes? Not as easy to put together as you would think. It took Matthew and I at least half an hour to put that bad boy together.

Then my sister looked at it and told me that I put the lid on backward. Oops. And apparently the set up in the picture (which is how I set it up) makes it super top heavy. So she fixed it. Oops again.

I'll get the hang of this gerbil stuff sooner or later. Hopefully sooner.

Thursday afternoon I spent with one of my friends. She lives about half an hour away, but her in-laws have this awesome pool that she gets to use. We decided it would be great to just lounge around the pool. I needed gas before I left town, and wouldn't you know, as soon as I paid for my gas, it started raining. And it rained the whole way there. And for at least an hour after I got there.

Sigh.

But it did finally stop raining, it was about 75 degrees instead of 90, and we finally made it to the pool.

And then it rained again. Urgh.

This pasty girl needs some sun! Especially to help cancel out my bizarre tan lines from our canoe trip.


Please note that my tan vanished from the knee down.

Because that's not weird or anything.

And finally, I had a two part photo shoot to do, plus I had to get my awesome 100 Follower Giveaway up and going (you did enter, right?)!

The weather was MUCH cooler than it was originally supposed to be, which was awesome for my shoot--and from what I've edited so far, I'm quite pleased with the results!

But I'm sure you don't want to see those.

Do you?

Ok, I haven't even edited this one yet, but I LOVE it. Like a lot.


And because I really like the two that I went ahead and edited so that the couple could get a sneak peek at their pictures, I'll just go ahead and share those with you, too.

Cute, right?!

Today I (finally) finished editing some pictures from a concert that I shot toward the end of May so that I wouldn't have to feel guilty about editing yesterday's shoot.

 And quite honestly, other than watering my flowers and blog stalking, that's pretty much all that I've done today.

I know, I know, I'm not REALLY busy.

But compared to last summer when I didn't crawl out of bed or get dressed until 4:00, this is busy.

Don't judge me. You know you're guilty of it, too.

Before I go polish off the last of the chocolate chip cookies I just made (thank you Tollhouse for your break apart cookie dough), have you joined in my 100 Follower Giveaway yet?!

If you haven't you should! SO MANY awesome prizes! (It would be wrong if I entered, right? I thought so.)

Because you were kind enough to read this far into my ramblings, here is a fun font that I finished up this afternoon that you can download for FREE!

Just click HERE to download it! If you make anything with it, can you show it to me? I LOVE seeing all of the cool stuff you guys make!

Since I know you've missed Charlie here are a couple pictures from this afternoon. I've now given you your cute dog fix for the day. You're welcome.


Oh! Quick shout out to all of my new followers! Hi guys!!!

Enjoy the rest of your weekend!

(Successful) DIY Day

As I mentioned in my last post, I'm on a bit of a DIY kick right now.

And yesterday was anything but successful. Remember this?

Umm, yeah. I rest my case.

But more on that in a minute.

Today was "Charlie Gets His Teeth Cleaned Day." For those of you that don't know what this entails (like I didn't), you take your dog to the vet in the morning, they whip out the anesthetic, knock him out, clean his teeth, and you pick him up late in the afternoon. That's a lot of work to clean teeth, if you ask me.

Since I still needed to pick up some supplies for my projects, I had my sister come with me to take Charlie to the vet so we could run errands while I was out. We got to Matthew's house to pick up Charlie, only to find out that the leash was still in Matthew's car. Slight problem. But since he only works about 5 minutes from his house, we drove over, met him in the parking lot, and got the leash.

Did I mention Charlie gets REALLY excited about car rides?

REALLY excited.

And then, he saw Matt and was EVEN MORE excited.

But then we left.

Whoa, buddy.

Charlie was NOT cool with that.

He cried.

And cried.

And didn't stop crying all the way to the vet. Did I mention that we got stopped by not 1, not 2, but 3 trains on this little trip?!

To top it off, he was shaking up a storm like he had just experienced the greatest trauma of his life.

He was temporarily transfixed by train #3.



We finally got him to the vet, and he was NOT cool with that either. Scratch that. He was fine getting out of the car and walking into the building, but as soon as I started filling out the paperwork, he was heading for the door.

No, he was literally walking to the door.

And when they came to get him, it was the barking, the cowering, the pulling at the leash, the mid-air acrobatics. Like his adventure at PetSmart the other day, but not quite as bad.

After dropping my favorite drama king off at the vet, my sister and I hit Panera (home of the world's hottest coffee) before running to JoAnn's and Lowes to finish getting the supplies I needed for my projects.

I would like to point out that these were supposed to be CHEAP projects. So not the case.

I got my awesome zebra print fabric for my crate seating and the chair I bought yesterday. Then I went to get the foam for the crate seats. Thank goodness for a 50% off coupon, because that stuff is ridiculously
E-X-P-E-N-S-I-V-E. Even with 50% off it was still $20 for 2 1/2 yards of the stuff-CRAZY!

At Lowe's, I found my beautiful paint for my chair (and was talked into buying a gallon of the stuff-lots of painting on the horizon). I was also able to show off my nonexistent lumber knowledge base as I struggled to explain what I needed for my crate seating. But, awesome thing about Lowes, they will cut the wood for you in store.

Turns out that it helps if you get your dimensions right. I'll be visiting my grandpa and his workshop tomorrow to make my particle board fit my crates.

Oops.

I also learned that my Jetta is not built for hauling leftover sheets of particle board. Mental note made.

Since I totally screwed up my crate seats for the day, I decided to start in on my chair. Ooo-and I didn't show you my chair yesterday, did I?

You are in for a treat.

You can't tell me that that chair isn't the most beautiful chair you've ever seen! Oh, and the fabric on the seat-LOVE IT! Absolutely gorgeous!

NOT.

So this afternoon, I sanded, I tightened screws, I painted, and I reupholstered.

Behold, my new classroom chair:

Not bad, right?! I'm pretty much in love with it. 

I also salvaged my disaster of a picture frame, which now looks like this:

MUCH better.

Ok, I know this is getting long, but when I got to Matt's this evening, Charlie was still a little drowsy from the anesthetic. 

He was so out of it.

I'll post a video later. It's quite entertaining.

EDIT: Here's that video I promised. I would like to point out that a)his right eye really can't stay open and b) he's falling asleep while sitting up.

Charlie After Anesthesia from Ms. Ellison on Vimeo.

Fail. Fail, fail, fail, fail, fail.

Went to Hobby Lobby this morning. Since I usually end up spending $100 on random stuff that I don't really NEED, I felt that my $35 trip was pretty impressive.

I really wanted to find some cute fabric for the crate seats that I'm wanting to make (you know, the cute ones from Pinterest?)

But, I didn't find anything that I loved.

Ok, there was this black fabric with white polka dots and a few randomly scattered silver glitter polka dots, but my sister didn't think that my students would want glitter on their butts. Weird, right?

I did find a picture frame for my class picture (the composite one that you get with everyone's yearbook pictures), and I found a black glitter spray paint to spruce it up with.

I was all excited to get home and start painting my frame, so I ran outside and started spraying away. And then...the can started making this hissing sound when I wasn't pushing the button. When I pushed the button, nothing happened.

Thinking it would run its course, I put the lid on the can, and let it hiss away.

Bad idea.

When I took the lid back off, it sounded like it had been seriously contemplating exploding.

So despite the fact that there was still PLENTY of paint in the can, I couldn't get anymore out of it. I then noticed that there was a puddle/glob of paint in one of the ridges of the frame. Thinking that I could just dab at it with my finger to spread it out, I instead wiped all of the paint off, leaving a giant white spot.

"Ok," I thought to myself. "This is easily fixed. Just make it look like you planned it to look like that. I ran in the house, grabbed some trusty paper towels, and went to work.

Sigh.

So NOT the look I was going for.

My next thought was that I could just paint the white area a bright color, but then my sister pointed out how uneven the glitter was (especially on the sides).

I now have another can of paint so that I can attack it again tomorrow. Wish me luck.

This was supposed to be an easy project. Fail.

Then, my parents' computer had a virus(s) that needed to be dealt with. Problem was that their antivirus software had expired, and they had been without it for a week. The subscription had been renewed, but the virus was blocking the software from activating (and just about everything else on the computer, too). It even tricked my sister into paying for "System Shield," a nonexistent virus remover, with her credit card. Needless to say, Visa received a phone call from her this afternoon. Sigh.

I was able to track down and remove a couple of the viruses myself, which let me run the (real) antivirus software and scan the computer. It even looked like it cleaned everything up. Then I got the phone call on the way to dinner to let me know that the virus was back. Fail again.

We also hit a antique/thrift store this afternoon where I found a chair that I'm planing on reupholstering and painting. That's on the agenda for tomorrow.

On another note, I've been really wanting to revamp my classroom for next year, but I didn't want to start from scratch. Right now, my "theme" is bright colors on black. I don't want to reinvent the wheel, but after seeing so many AWESOME classrooms recently, I need a change. So I've decided to finally remove the multicolored bulletin board border that I've had up for the last two years in lieu of something new.

But I've been having trouble deciding. I looked at some stuff at the teacher store in town, but nothing really jumped out at me. I was thinking something black and white to accent the colors, polka dots, chevrons, etc. Then it finally hit me as I was looking at upholstery for my new chair. My new theme is doing to be...drumroll, please...

ZEBRA!

How cute will that be?!

I'm thinking lime green, hot pink, or turquoise for the paint color and a zebra seat on the chair. The crates that I bought for my Pinterest project are a coral which I think will look really good with the zebra.

I'm excited!

Hopefully I'll have LOTS of SUCCESSFUL project pictures to share in my next post!

Wish me luck!

Oh, I'm also taking Charlie to the vet in the morning to get his teeth cleaned. And I'll be trying out the doggy seat belt again. Pray for me.

Have a great night!

New look, new resource!

Ok, I know that I promised a freebie when I hit 50 followers, but, well, it took A LOT longer than I thought to finish it up.

And I mean A LOT longer.

And it certainly doesn't help that I'm a perfectionist and spent a insane amount of time moving text boxes around the page-and not big moves, mind you, teeny tiny, minuscule nudges around the page.

I know, I'm ridiculous.

Of course, it didn't help that halfway through my awesome resource (see how I'm building suspense?) I got momentarily distracted inspired and ended up redesigning my entire blog.

Oh yeah, I made this from scratch. By myself. Google helped out, too.

No more generic template for this girl-my blog now has a one-of-a-kind design. And I love it. (Can you tell?!?!)

Wouldn't you know, my freebie that I made just for you is pretty darn awesome, too! (Not that I'm going to tell you what it is yet. Suspense. Duh.)


Charlie and I had a lovely walk this morning-it was nice and cool, the birds were chirping, he barked at every dog in the neighborhood (and the nice old man that was just trying to say "Hello").

This afternoon while I was creating, Charlie took a nap. I'm pretty sure this dog should be named "Pretzel"-I really have no idea how he gets himself into some of his crazy positions. Stranger yet, he actually sleeps while contorted. Weirdo.

This position doesn't actually look all that weird at first. But then you realize that there's something crazy going on with those front paws. And the dangling leg. He's just too cute for his own good.

Anywho--I know you're just DYING to know what I've cooked up for my 50 Follower Freebie! So without further ado, may I present to you...

The Laura Ellison

Independent Reading Journal of Awesomeness!!!!!

(What? Too much?)

You get:

• 4 color covers (with a super cute chevron background
• 2 black and white covers (one with chevrons, one without)
• A journal checklist
• Book Fact Sheet
• Daily reading log
• Character Portrait
• Setting Snapshot
• Point of View Postcard
• Book Review
• Journal completion/scoring sheet
• 2 Daily Journal pages (4 designs)

Basically, your kids can use this with any book that they're reading independently. Consider it...an alternative book report. And, it's an easy way for you to hold them accountable for their independent reading. 

On the daily reading log, they can log how long they read and how many pages they read. After the finish reading, they fill out (half) a journal page. Because there are two entries on a page. In their journal entry, they write a short summary of what they read that day, and then make a connection to the text (which is GREAT practice for those pesky extended response questions!). 

There is a TON of fun stuff in this set! Seriously, I am in LOVE with it! 

Since you were one of my first 50 57 followers, you get it for free!!! Yay, you!!!

You better hurry and download it, because it won't be free forever! It'll be $3.00 in my TpT store starting Saturday, so spread the word! It's too late for this freebie, but you can still get buy it in my TpT store!

Enjoy your evening!

Whew! Who turned up the heat?!?!

Ok. For starters, it is NOT supposed to be 98 with a heat index of 103 in May. Or ever, for that matter. But definitely not in May.

How am I supposed to keep my flowers alive if it's going to be this hot this soon?!?!

And how will I survive in my non-air-conditioned classroom in August if this craziness keeps up?!?!

Needless to say, very little of my day was spent in the great outdoors. Went to church, had some Panera for lunch (yum!), stalked caught up on a few blogs, took Charlie to PetSmart to get his talons claws trimmed, cooked out with Matthew's parents, parked back at my computer and listened to some tunes.

Pretty uneventful.

Except for Charlie's trip to PetSmart.

We got Charlie from the animal shelter a few years ago. We don't really know anything about his past (though we've heard a rumor that he lived on a farm for a while), but he's got some issues. Don't get me wrong, he's the sweetest dog ever. Super cuddler. (Is that a word? It should be.)

But yeah, issues.

When he meets someone new, he FREAKS out. Like howling, barking, cowering, you name it. And don't even THINK about trying to pet him--he'll pee on you. He's not agressive; I've never seen him even think about biting someone (Ok, there was that one time when he nipped at me, but in his defense, I was trying to put a sweater on him. And he wasn't going for blood. He just didn't want to wear that sweater.) Give him 20 minutes to get used to the idea of you, and he'll be curled up on your lap, sound asleep.

Needless to say, a trip to PetSmart is always interesting. First of all, I doubt that any dog enjoys getting his nails trimmed, add in Charlie's issues, and you're in for a wild ride.

Almost...there.....

Am I the only one who can't focus without music? I've been planning on blogging all afternoon, but until I get some music playing, I'm so distracted! I check Facebook, I check Pinterest, Yahoo, read blogs, check Facebook and Pinterest again; I am in no way productive. Heck, I tried listening to music on my computer and it was distracting me. Ok, I have a record on now. I should be able to focus now.

 (Yeah, I said a record. I have a record collection because I'm cool like that. Charlie, however, decided that he wanted to try one out as a snack the other night. Not cool. )

I feel like I need to make an outline for this post, I have so much that I want to talk about!

Laura's Blog Post Outline

1. End of the year motivators
2. Memory books/advice to next year's class
3. Character trait word clouds
4. Update on classroom organization
5. Preparing for next year (already!)
6. A really awesome website (for next year)

Whew! That's quite the list--let's get this started!

Spring Planting

Today Matthew and I decided to tackle some long overdue yard work. Around 2:00, we went to Walmart to pick up plants and then hit Rural King to grab some potting soil (since I completely forgot it while at Walmart) and a couple bushes.

So here's the deal. I love planting flowers. Each year I load up my cart full of bright and colorful plants and set off to make the house beautiful. Which it is for a few weeks. The problem is, I never really developed a green thumb. Mine is probably closer to...brown. I am awful when it comes to actually watering and trimming plants. And so, after a few weeks, they're all brown and shriveled up.

But not this year. I have every intention of having my plants actually survive the summer. Matthew and I spent the entire afternoon mulching leaves, pulling weeks, planting flowers, and laying mulch. Oh, and I made a super cute planter. More on that tomorrow.

Granted, every year I say that I'll do better, but this year I think I might really mean it! As Matthew pointed out on the way back from Rural King, "You have the summer off. It's not like you really have anything to do, other than keep the plants alive." So, that is my goal. Keep the plants alive.