Halloween Weekend

Oh how needed this weekend was. I never put on any make-up yesterday and didn't do anything else to my hair other than run a brush through it. It was one of those days. I needed a day to just do nothing. I slept in late. Only time I left my apartment was to pick up hamburger buns for dinner...and run thru the McD's drive-thru for a large coke.

Last weekend when the girls and I celebrated my birthday all day (that post will be coming soon!) one of the things we did was go to a Pumpkin Patch to pick out a pumpkin. I got a big pumpkin to carve, and then three little ones. The pumpkin I got to carve is probably the biggest pumpkin I've ever had!

This pumpkin was thick and required great effort to carve a face on! Dayna helped me carve. Here's proof of how thick it was:


The best part of carving a pumpkin- baking and eating the seeds!


The final product- nothing fancy! I'm all about generic happy-face pumpkins. Ha!


I love this festive door-hanging I got for a little over $3 last year on clearance!




That was my Saturday. It was lazy and relaxing, but I don't think I mentioned I also did a week's worth of Reading Lesson plans- so it wasn't completely lazy.

Today I went to church. I really like the new church I'm going to. I don't know many people yet- but I think it's a place where I can get connected and such. Sometimes I think the benefit of going to a church at first where you don't know anyone is that is pushes you to meet new people and get involved. It also is helping me focus on the reason I go to church in the first place; to grow closer to God and learn His ways so that I can be an example for others in my actions.

In the afternoon, Dayna, Jessica and I headed to Pioneer Days in Lake Wales. It's just a small fall festival with food, vendors, crafts, and rides for the kids. We didn't stay long at all- just long enough for me to spend $16 on dogwear for my family's two dogs that don't even live with me. My youngest sister just got a dog, so now there's two. If you know me well, you're probably wondering how I, of all people, would spend money on dog accessories. I have never been a dog person, but it's no lie that my family's dog, Jack, stole my heart.

Isn't he precious?

I bought Jack and Jilly little bandana things....candy cane matching ones for Christmas, and then a FL Gator one for Jack, and a Thanksgiving one for Jilly. I'm sure there will be a picture of them in the near future modeling their new dogwear. Ha! I'm ridiculous.

After Pioneer Days, we headed to one of the best restaurants ever- Manny's!! It was a great dinner of Manny's salad, warm rolls with cinnamon butter and a Manny's sirloin steak!

This weekend I discovered Picnik you may have noticed. It's a website that makes photo editing fun. It's my new favorite thing to do. I've seen it done on other blogs and I always wondered how they did it. Picnik is free and allows you to add text, borders, stickers, etc. to your pictures just to add some flare! I'll try not to go overboard with it! Ha!

So that was my Halloween weekend! A lowkey weekend is just what I needed after two previous non-stop, on-the-go weekends. Tomorrow is going to be treated as normal as possible at school. I will do some Halloween story read-alouds and will pass out a little Halloween treat to my students at the end of the day, but that's about it. Our fun was Friday. If I let tomorrow feel like Halloween all day, I will pay for it the rest of the week. Three weeks 'til Thanksgiving break!

Happy Halloween! :)

Wacky Wear Day

Yesterday was "Wacky Wear Day" at the school I teach at. The mascot of our school is the stallion, so each month our students earn horseshoe tickets and if they have enough to meet the goal at the end of the month, they get to attend or participate in "Oscarbration." Oscar J. Pope is the name of the school- so the name Oscarbration is derived from that. This is the behavior incentive in place at our school. I only had a few students who did not meet the monthly goal for horseshoes, so they didn't get to participate in dressing "wacky."

It was encouraged that teachers dress wacky, too! That was easy for Dayna and I considering we put together Thing 1 and Thing 2 costumes three years ago while we were in college. We won a $30 gift card for winning "Best Costume" that year!


This year, we added Cat in the Hat to our fun! The students called us "The Cat in the Hat Family!" How cute is that??


This Cat in the Hat has a baby in her tummy!


Jessica was a mime! She didn't talk the WHOLE day! She typed or motioned anything that needed to be communicated to her students. I was impressed!


The day was fun seeing students and staff dressed wacky. Especially since the day prior, we, (teachers) were in our most professional attire for our big state instructional review. But days that are less-structured are the longest days ever. They feel like they last forever. It's fun and everything, but when it lasts all day, it feels like it lasts all week. It makes you thankful that you have a schedule in place because without one, everything just feels crazy.

Dayna, me, Shawna, Jessica, and Jennifer


In college when Dayna and I came up with these costumes, as elementary ed. majors, we thought it'd be cool that if one day we worked at the same school, we could wear this and go into classrooms and read Dr. Seuss books. Well, turns out that we ended up getting jobs at the same school and were able to have fun with our Thing 1 and Thing 2 costumes with our students!

So that was our day of Wacky Wear chaos fun!

Now I will leave you with a sweet note from one of my students, left on my computer for me to find after dismissal.

THIS is what makes every moment worth it.

A Post of Random-ness

It's Tuesday evening already. Yesterday was a teacher work-day, so in some ways, today feels like Monday...the beginning of the week with students, at least.
There is this week, plus the next three weeks, until our week-long Thanksgiving Break. Looking forward to that.

I have a post saved in my drafts of my birthday which was Friday, but the darn Blogger photo uploader thinks it's a good idea to take a million years to upload one photo, so needless to say, it could take me a million years to finish that post. Posts really are so much less interesting when there are no pictures to accompany.

I love watching the News. It's something I look forward to in the evenings- the 10:00 news show. I guess I just like to hear what's happening locally and also abroad. It keeps me feeling nerdy updated. I don't know why I felt the need to blog this- but remember the title of this post is "A Post of Random-ness." Maybe that explains it?

Speaking of the news, which I'm watching as I type this, Lindsay Lohan just needs to be taken out of Hollywood fame. She and her family are always getting in trouble for something! What happened to the innocent red-head who starred in The Parent Trap?

I enjoyed a wonderful dinner last night with three of my college friends- Lauren, Whitney and Dayna. I laughed harder than I have in a long time! Between Dayna sharing dating-gone-bad stories, Lauren recalling freshman-year-of-college-memories, and Whitney sharing how-to-embarrass-yourself stories, we all laughed a good amount! We made a pact to try and get together monthly for dinner which I am not complaining about! I love these girls so much! (It should be noted that I did attempt to take pictures at the restaurant, but my camera battery was dead.)

I signed myself up to be the Secretary of my school's PTO tonight. We have a volunteer starting this organization at the school I work at and I feel that it's necessary in building a positive school climate. I believe that in establishing this PTO, our students will gain a more positive outlook on our school due to some of the new things they will be able to be a part of!

Grades are due on Friday. My school's BIG Department of Education State Review is Thursday (translated: the "higher-ups" from the Florida D.O.E. will be walking around our campus all day Thursday visiting all classrooms to make sure everything is happening like it should.) It's only a lot little nervewracking. It's a big week for us. I'm still trying to learn that if I grade papers as soon as I collect them, they won't all stack up at the end of the grading period. But....I just abhor grading writing. Absolutely abhor.

So- I've already mentioned how I think blog posts without pictures are boring. But I also mentioned that Blogger is being difficult. So, I'm going to end my post of random-ness

HERE.

25

On Friday, October 21st, I turned 25! I personally think it's crazy and it's starting to make me feel old! Especially considering my dad was 25 when I was born, and my parents had already been married for two years! Nonetheless, I am officially 25 years old! I can rent a car now and am keeping my fingers crossed that my car insurance rate will lower now, too! :)

I worked on Friday of course, but it really is fun to have your birthday on a weekday when you're a teacher. The kids make it such a big deal which makes you feel loved and special! They give the best they have- a homemade card or trinket- and they give it with a great big heart and smile on their face. How can you not be touched? Even though they may have said the exact same thing to their teacher last year, it still makes you feel like a million dollars. :)

I teach 5th grade, so I planned on letting the kids' know my age by solving it in some type of Math equation. So I asked them what a century was. Then, I told them I was 1/4 century old. My class is bright this year- so it didn't take them long to say, "You're 25!" Some of them cheated and saw candles on my desk, a 2 and a 5 candle, from my friend Jessica who had generously made me a cake!

After work, Dayna, Jessica, Audra and I headed to Brandon to go to the Cheesecake Factory. My family was meeting us there from Sarasota too. I was grateful that everyone could come!






After working all week, mixed in with a Parent Night, and a 45 minute principal observation on Thursday, I was exhausted. My birthday celebrations for my actual birthday ended with dinner. By the time dinner was over anyway, most places were closed. My friends assured me, however, that I needed to get a good night's sleep anyway because the next day they had things planned. It was all a surprise!

Saturday I was able to sleep in which I always love! Dayna and I headed to pick up Audra and Jessica at their apartment to begin the day. When we pulled out of their complex, Jessica said, "Are you ready for a day of 25 things you get to do?" I had to sign a waiver stating that I would participate in all activities without asking questions.

Part 2 to come!

Spontaneous Road Trip

A week ago tonight, Audra, Dayna and I left FL around 8:30 p.m. to head to a state that has a real Fall, complete with cooler temps and beautiful color-changed leaves!


We left on Thursday. We planned it on Saturday, 5 days prior. We put in for substitutes (we're all teachers), created sub plans, prepped our students for our absence, and then forgot about everything school-related for a quick 3 days.
We stopped Thursday night at a hotel in Valdosta, GA. We woke up early Friday morning to complete our travels to our final destination in North Carolina. Our first stop in NC was a corn maze that none of us had ever done/seen before! It was so festive and fun! Then, we went on a hayride. It was beautiful outside that evening!










When we were finished with the corn maze festivities, we got back in the car to drive to Asheville, NC where we stayed for 2 nights. We checked in, admired the cozy hotel, and headed out to dinner. After dinner we drove around downtown Asheville just to take in the sights.

The next day, Saturday, we headed to Waynesville, NC to go to their annual Apple Festival! It was so much fun! It was your typical "craft fair" type atmosphere- lots of vendors selling their foods, crafts, etc., live music, cloggers, and lots of food! I got a few things, including some yummy peanut brittle!

The leaves in Waynesville were absolutely beautiful!










After the apple festival, we drove on the Blue Ridge Parkway to head to Mt. Pisgah for dinner. We ate in a restaurant that has a panoramic view! It was busy and we had to wait over an hour to be seated...but during that hour we got to experience sunset in the mountains, what is there to complain about??

When we checked out of the hotel Sunday morning, we asked about their rates and availability for December, right when we start our winter break...so it looks like we're going back! Next time- we plan on visiting the Biltmore Estate and it'll be decorated for Christmas. Hopefully we'll also be able to see some snow on the mountains! This trip, although short, was well worth every moment to see the beauty of the season!

My Shutterfly Book

When I bought my new laptop back in April, with the purchase I received an offer from Shutterfly for a free, hardcover 8x8 photo book. I was excited because I love projects like these and I had never made one before! Oh, and it was free! Who doesn't love that?

I had six months in which to redeem the offer before it expired but at first struggled to decide which pictures I would include in the book. If you know me, you know I'm a perfectionist when it comes to things like this, and I also like things to be coordinated. This shutterfly book was no different. The pictures that were to be in this book had to be in relation to each other in some way.

While I was in Alabama this summer, I realized how this year, I had visited four new places: Keystone, CO, then Alabama, and then Cozumel and the Grand Cayman Islands on the cruise. There was the coordination I needed- the photo book would have pictures of my different trips.

Here's the finished product that I received in the mail a few weeks ago, just days after ordering it online! (I didn't take a picture of all the pages, but there are 20pages in all!)

Both the front cover and back cover are pictures of the sunset I took while on the cruise!






After each trip's section in the book, I wrote a little re-cap. On this specific page, the background picture is an actual picture I took of Alabama's beautiful scenery.





It took about a month to work on this, but I didn't work on it every day. You have to be selective about which pictures to use and there are so many different layouts to choose from, in addition to fonts, graphics, etc. It makes it hard for perfectionists like me to do a project like this quickly!

Shutterfly is so user-friendly and the books really do turn out in great quality! I would certainly recommend making one-I bet they make really nice gifts, too! I am looking forward to finding a reason to make another photo book soon!