Reasons to Celebrate! {FREEBIE}

This week has been about celebrations and preparing for upcoming celebrations!  After all, the END is in sight, ladies and gents!!  Let's hear some reasons to **celebrate** PLUS a freebie!!

CELEBRATE SUMMER!

Tuesday marked our 10 day countdown.  For a few years now, we have been sending the school year off with a <<BANG>> and doing a balloon popping countdown.

We filled each balloon with a fun surprise for the kids.  The last 10 days of school, I do not do my typical behavior chart stickers and treasure box prizes.  We do more immediate rewards {can I get an Amen???} to help with all of the end-of-year crazies.  Each day is a new celebration and the kids get SOOOOO super excited to find out who will get to POP the balloon!
 ....and POP!

Here are the 10 surprises we put inside the balloons.  Click to download the FREEBIE!!
   
The kids have literally shrilled and screamed over this every.day.  And I'm not gonna lie, while they are still ooooooober crazy, their behavior has been surprisingly good during our countdown.  They do NOT want to miss out on our fun!

CELEBRATE RETIREMENT!

Have a friend or colleague retiring this year? This retirement printable is a hot item in my store at the end of the year!  These look great framed and displayed at a retirement celebration!

CELEBRATE LEARNING!

Last week we wrapped up our Cinderella Unit {insert sad face here} and started preparing for our Cinderella Fairytale Ball which is next week {insert happy face here!}  Last year was our first year to do this and it is...

SO.

MUCH.

FUN.

I'm sure you are thinking that the boys are not into it at all, and there have been a few {okay, a LOT of} "eewwwws" and gross faces, but they are just smiling the whole time and have had a blast!  And last year, ALL of my kids---even the boys talked about the Ball for the rest of the year!

To prepare for our Fairytale Ball Celebration, we have been talking about our formal etiquette and manners for eating and for greeting each other {bows and curtsies}.

We also brought in private dance instructors to teach our kids the waltz!


Goodness, we have so many first graders {175} that it's hard to fit them all in one picture!!  The dance instructors did a fantastic job separating the boys and girls and teaching them each their steps.

Then, they practiced dancing with a partner to the fancy music.  I was too busy playing the "boy" dancer for a sweet girl to get any pictures of their partner dancing.  But I'm sure I'll have PLENTY of pictures next Thursday, when we have our actual Fairytale Ball.

We will spend the next few days in our rooms practicing our skills so that our dancing will be perfect by Thursday {read about the Ball here}!

CELEBRATE  PEOPLE!

Our week ended today with an absolutely flawless celebration of a special birthday.  Mr. Walter Turnbow, the sweet man our school is named after, turned 90 today!   His family planned a special day full of surprise celebrations for him and his first celebration was at our school.  It was one of the sweetest things I've been a part of in a long, long, LONG time.  I was fortunate to get to see more of it because I had a meeting at school today and was not in my classroom.  So, I got attend all of the celebrations, not just part of it.

Mr. Turnbow pulled up to our school in a "Party Bus" with his wife and family.  Our school honor choir was on the porch along with our administrators and district administration guests.  I was so lucky to get to be on the porch with them and see Mr. Turnbow's face up close!

When he got out of the bus, we greeted him and sang, "Happy Birthday," and then released 90 purple and green {our school colors} balloons.  The rest of our kids lined the parking lot and cheered and sang for him as he drove up to our school.  All 860 of our Turnbow kiddos.  It. Was. Beautiful.

After that, the kids went inside and the family and special guests went to the library for a reception.  {I got to sneak in there and watch since I was out of the classroom today!}  Our choir sang two songs, one of which our AMAZING choir director wrote especially for Mr. Turnbow.



We were all in tears.  Including me.  And I'm not a crier--at all!  Then, Mr. Turnbow received one gift from each grade level.  Two kids from each grade presented the gift to him.  More Tears.  Omigoodness it was the sweetest thing!  Kindergarten gave him a notebook full of notes from their sweet babies.  In first grade, we painted a tree on canvas and the kids made leaves with their thumbprints. Here it is before the final touches were made!
                               

Second grade made a handprint quilt.  Third Grade gave a photograph of kids spelling out TURNBOW.  Fourth grade gave Mr. Turnbow a frame telling him how old he was in years, months, days, hours, minutes and seconds {ha!}.  Fifth grade gave him a photograph of their kids forming the number 90 and individually wrapped candies created in 1924 (Bit-O-Honey and Dum-Dums} for each of the guests.
**Mr. Turnbow's birthday pictures are courtesy of Springdale Schools.**

Watching all of the gift giving reminded me so much of being in the room with my sweet Grandpa Murry.  Mr. Turnbow's sweet, soft, and loving spirit captured everything I remember about Grandpa.  {Oh, how I miss that dear man!}

With the end in sight, this week was full of celebrations...from little to big.  And they were each so special and memorable in their own way.  We have a lot of reasons to celebrate: the end of a unit, the end the year, and growing older.  I hope I live a life that deserves the kind of 90th year celebration we had for sweet Mr. Turnbow today!

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