Five for Fraturday, Saturday Slim Down & A Surprise!

I am doubling down today…well not exactly, then I'd be playing blackjack which I am not…I am joing 2 linky parties and I have a little surprise to share too!

It has been a crazy week.  We don’t ever get snow, no chance even, but we have horrible fog.  We had at least a 2 hour delay every day this week except Friday.  2 days buses were even canceled, so I only had 11 out of 20 kiddos.  One day the 2 hour delay turned into a 3 hour delay, just a total mess!

Needless, to say I am glad this week is over because my lesson plans were a total wreck!  Everyday, I was rearranging and moving things around to accommodate our strange schedule and my lack of students.  As a result we did not get everything done that I wanted to this week. But we did get in some great review and learned a few new things.

On with the fun. First I am linking up with Kacey at Doodle bugs for her Five for Friday on Saturday, per my usual tardiness with this linky…lol. I am always spent by Friday evening and don’t get anything accomplished once I get home.

Since I have failed to link lately I am going to be sharing 5 things from the last several weeks. I must warn you it is a little long and overloaded with pics.

So how was your holiday break?  Does it seem like a distant memory already…haha! We had a great time.  We had many family gatherings with way too much good food. We then headed to the beach to camp out for 5 days.  

Yes that is ice on the windows and top of the truck.  That is exactly why I was ready for the beach! I call it camping, but that isn’t exactly right.  It is more like trailering.  All I have to do is press a button to turn on the generator and tada, we have all the comforts of home. TV, Video games for the boys, Keurig machine for me. But, we do open the door and step into the sand and the view is incredible. We always camp with several other friends and family members so it is a blast.

Even when we are not at the race track the boys are racing….

We also spent two weekends at the race track.  It is great family fun and I love watching my boys.  It is a little nerve wracking at times, I will admit.  My babies, I know they really aren't anymore, are going 60+ miles an hour around a track bumping other cars.  But they love it. It gets pretty exciting, especially when they are winning.  Which we have fortunately been doing a lot of lately.

We started back to school on the 8^th, yes a Thursday.  Our admin thought it would ease the kiddos back into the school routine easier.  So we only had 2 days of school.  Not a lot of time.  We did finish up our study of digraphs by doing a circle map of PH.

You can find our other digraph circle maps here and here. We then completed our ph soundbrochure.  These are from Simply Kinder and they are terrific.  They give a great review of what we have covered and my favorite thing is they each have a section for home.  Something easy the kiddos can do with their parents to keep everyone involved. They love them and think they are special since it is a “brochure”…lol. It cracks me up sometimes that they get excited about the simplest things. 

Despite our crazy week this week we did dive into blends.  I start with the “L” blends.  This week we studied BL and CL.

For our short week we did a fantastic job in writer’s workshop.  We wrote about what we did on our vacation…of course.  They are growing so much as writers and I am supper proud of my kiddos.

These two didn’t know any of their letters when school started and now they are stretching out their words. So excited for them.  In case you don’t read kindergarten…(left side) "We are playing soccer outside." (right side) "My and Luna’s birthday."

This sweetie just melts my heart with what she wrote.  “I and my brother are playing soccer.  Me and my brother we love each other.”

This little guy did a fantastic job sounding out his words, and he was super busy during vacation.  “I went to Anthony’s house. I went to Chuck-e-Cheese.  I saw Anthony at John’s Incredible Pizza. I went to the buffet. I saw Ricardo. I went home. I ate a donut.” Sounds like a great vaca to me.

We also read one of my favorite winter books. Sneezy the snowman.  We then wrote about the story elements. 

 Next we drew and wrote about the effects of making bad choices.  They did a great job sequencing what happened in the story, what the bad choices were and the consequences.

They look great hanging in our quilt display, too!

Finally we completed a spin, graph and build a snowman.  I love incorporating math with our ELA units. 

Our snowmen made such a cute wall display in our room!

These activities for Sneezy can all be found from the fabulous Deanna Jump here. 

This week we read my favorite book for learning about Martin Luther King Jr.,  Martin’s Big Words.  We also discussed vocabulary from our story to get a better understanding.

We even made these adorable Martin’s from Katie Knight’s American Hero’s pack.  They came out adorable. Sorry for the lack of pics.  They needed quite a bit of guidance with this one so I didn’t have time to snap more of the fun.

Well, you have made it this far, whew!  So I figured I would share my surprise before moving on to my 2^nd linky. 

 Friday I got some big news.  I was chosen as Teacher of the Year for my school/district.  I was totally surprised and humbled. I work with a great bunch of teachers and feel totally honored to have been bestowed this award. I was pretty excited I have to say!

Now for my next linky.  I am joining Gina over at Teaching with a Touch of Pixie Dust for her Slim Down Saturday!

I am 10 days into my resolution and this is how it is going.

I am down another 2 pounds this week for a total of 5, woo hoo!  Inch by Inch I’ll get there.  At least that’s what I keep telling myself when I am eyeing those donuts in the teacher's lounge. I have NOT had any by the way.  

My positives for the week are I cut my caffeine down to 1 cup of coffee a day.  If you know me this is quite an accomplishment.  The coffee it self doesn’t have a ton of calories, but what I put in it to drink it sure does…lol. I am choosing instead green tea and I am really enjoing it.  I also managed to increase my water intake.

I did have an epic fail in the exercise department.  As in, I did none, at all, not even a little.  I know that I have to in order to get the results I ultimately want.  I do enjoy working out, I just have to make it a priority. I know once I get back in the habit it will be much easier. SO that is at the top of the list…again this week!

For this next week I am really trying to stick with all whole foods.  Which means really cooking every night.  A few times this past week I was so tired I resorted to a lean cuisine in the microwave.  I know that was better than hitting the fast food drive through, but I know I can do better.

This was my inspiration this week…

Well congrats if you made it through this marathon post.  I love reading all your comments.  So let me know how your week went.  Be sure to check out the two linkys above and have a great week!