My First Linky!!

 

I am attempting my first linky with Doodle Bugs...let's see how it goes!



 

 

 

 

I save burnt out light bulbs every year and repurpose them as snowmen ornaments.  I always put a request in my newsletter right around this time of year for kids to bring in old light bulbs. 

 

This is one of my favorite craftivities to do with the kids.  It's so simple, the results are adorable, and I *think* it is a school-made gift a parent might actually keep because it's cute and not just because they feel obligated to keep it because their child made it.

 

All you need is...

*Watered-down Elmer's glue

*Paintbrushes

*"Clear" Glitter...or maybe it's called iridescent??

*black and orange tempera paints or Puffy Paint

* strips of fabric

*hot glue gun

*ribbon or large paper clips 

 

Here's what you do:

1. Hot glue a looped string to the twisty part of the light bulbs or manipulate paper clips to act as ornament hooks (pliers can be helpful)

2.  Have kids hold bulbs by the twisty part and paint the entire bulb with watered-down glue...sprinkle glitter on and hang to dry. (I normally call a small group of kids back to my kidney table rather than attempt for the whole class to do this at the same time).

3.  After the bulbs have dried students add nose, eyes, buttons, and mouth.  My partners have had better luck with Puffy Paint...I stick with the tempera paints because the school has them.  The paintbrushes you needed were for the glue...for the faces I've found that dipping a sharp pencil in paint and dabbing it works well and gives the kids more control/precision.

4.  This picture shows snowmen that all have the same scarves, but the last couple years I have had a variety of Christmas-y and winter-y scarves that the kids can choose from.  Hot gluing the scarves really only requires one dot of glue where the scarf overlaps itself.  

*That's it!

 

You may want to glue the scarves on before the kids paint faces because then they are more apt to make the face the appropriate size...but you run the risk of them getting paint all over the scarf.

 

One of my teaching partners, Teaching with Giggles, has added little twig arms with hot glue and they turned out super cute! 

                        

 

We have a LOT of new staff at our school this year.  One of our fourth grade teachers used to make these cute little name plaques as a welcome gift whenever someone new joined the staff.  She retired last year and an AWESOME parent volunteer (whose daughter is currently in my class and I taught her older sister) noticed that none of the new teachers and assistants had them...so I got volunteered to take over the tradition.  I don't mind though, I actually had a lot of fun.  And the parent volunteer along with our former fourth grade teacher helped me with this year's batch of plaques because there were so many.

 

Anyway, I would like to give away 2 plaques with whatever name or saying you would like on them...just leave a comment and your email.  I will contact the winners and send your plaque as a "thank you" for stopping by! Winners have been chosen, but I'd still love it if you joined my followers!!

 

 

             

This may be one of my best ideas to date: a hallway bulletin board that can stay up all year!  In September there were apples with the students' names on them.  In October we painted fall leaves.  Soon we will swap those out for snowflakes.  And in the spring we'll make buds and blossoms.  The writing was done with chalk and hair-sprayed to keep it from smearing too bad.  

 

 

What do you do when you slash around in too many puddles and end up with cold, wet feet?  Buck up and deal with your poor choices...that's what I say.  There's something to be said for a good ol' natural consequence.  Maybe next time you'll think twice before jumping into that oh-so-tempting frigid water.  Or, I guess this works too.  Stuff a massive amount of paper towels in your shoes before the teacher notices what you are doing and continue work as usual.  I can appreciate the problem-solving, so I had to snap a picture.

 

 

We moved into our house 4? 5? years ago.  As part of the closing deal we had the previous owner pay to remove the master bathroom shower that had leaked and was causing some water-damage issues.  We were going to update the bathroom anyway, so we didn't have them put in a shower.  We lived with an unfinished master bathroom until about a year ago when we decided it was finally time to do something.  DH did a great job demo-ing the bathroom...ripping flooring out, the vanity, the toilet, the drywall, the insulation.  He also (with a teensy bit of help from yours truly) did a great job putting in new insulation and laying a custom cement shower-pan.  I've been much less than decisive about my vision for the bathroom...or l should say I haven't completely agreed to his ideas and he isn't fond of mine either...so we've been at a stand-still since...early spring?  Oh my goodness...maybe this weekend it's time to iron out some compromises b/c I don't know how much longer I can live with the disarray. I can't tell if it's the constant clutter of displaced bathroom items or the 150mg of Clomid finally kicking in...but I'm about to blow a gasket!

Here's to hoping we all have a peaceful weekend without blown gaskets!

Remember, you can still join the party and link up with Doodle Bugs!