Our little boy loves trains more than peanut butter loves jelly!  So it was only fitting that we celebrate with a vintage trains birthday party!


A little duct tape, foam board and vinyl silhouetting by my awesome mom-in-law made the perfect entrance to our boy's party!

This wreath was so fun to make with left over scraps of bandana, burlap and fabric.  And, it's for sale if anyone local wants it now that the party is over!

The one thing Cooper asked for when I asked him what he wanted at his party was a "big yocamotive" that he could stick his head in for pictures!  So I painted one on foam board and daddy propped it up for us...

And then little one decided he didn't really want to take his picture in it...so we had to beg for this one!

Here are more party decorations!


The perfect thing about this party is we just used his toys to decorate!






This fabric sway took about 2-3 bandanas and probably less than 1/2 a yard of fabric.  And it was so easy.  I'm a little in love with these swags these days!

Party favors...baggage claim!


Just a bandana and a train whistle from Oriental Trading and some twine to tie it all together!





Yes, we had quesadillas.  That was the only other thing this kid requested.   And his heart was so happy to have quesadillas!
The food crates are from JoAnn Fabrics.




All of these printables from the party, plus custom invitations and thank you notes can be found HERE.

Thanks to my sister-in-law for the gorgeous cookies!  Order yours HERE!

Thanks again to Shelby Lynn's for an amazing cake....if only it were a white background and not teal. Yeah, I actually had them write, "no teal!" on the ticket.  But it's okay, they offered to redo or give me a free replacement cake on my account....so free cake is in our future!  Hard to be too mad when it still turned out super cute!

Along with water, we had "diesel fuel" aka unsweet tea to drink.  Love how perfect this train turned out for holding sweetener!  Gotta credit my momma for this idea!


"All Aboard!!"


He was in awe of his "monowail." <3

Love this hat haired boy!!





Dear Cooper,

Happy birthday week to you, my sweet little one, turning 3 on the 28th!  We've almost survived the terrible twos...

...and BOY were they TERRIBLE...

Everyone told me, "Welcome to the terrible twos," after your last birthday.  And I cringed every time. Not because I didn't think we'd have some terrible moments...because we DID have some terrible moments....

You became a pro at walking, running, and jumping.  You were unstoppable.  You even got away from us many, many times.  I remember watching you as you were falling several times and I couldn't get there fast enough.  It was almost like a slow motion camera playing through my mind as you fell.

You were are quite the "tripper."  Like the time you busted your head open in Disney World 10 minutes after we checked into the hotel.

You threw many fits, tantrums, and went all out Mr. Fussy Pants on several occasions.  

You tore up many things of ours...if it had a sticker on it and was in your reach, it was pretty much a goner.  Glasses were broken, papers ripped, and chairs turned over...

You depantsed yourself multiple times in the house, and luckily only a few times outside in our front yard.

You pottied in places only boy mommies would know about...and then some.

You spit food out of your mouth.  At our house.  At restaurants.  

You screamed at inappropriate times...even as quiet as you are, it would just "come over you" at times...

You bit.

You hit.

You kicked.

You said, "no."  Like 5 gazillion times.  And then some more.

But I prayed for these moments.  Sweet toddler of mine, during the years your daddy and I prayed for you, I hurt a little each time I heard someone tell of their "terrible twos" experience in a frustrated way.  Because I would've given anything to have those terrible experiences with my own toddler.

And then, God gave us our turn.  And, yes, we had our terrible moments.  But that did not define you, my love.  You are not any of those terrible things.  Most days...

You are calm and quiet.
You are a thinker.
You are creative.
You are a caretaker.
You are kind to others.
You are mannerly.
You are a great, healthy eater.
You are gentle.
You are obedient.
You love Jesus, your family and your friends.
You are loved.
You are a Child of God.
And you are ours.

Mommy loves you, Boo Bear!







Don't let anyone ever tell you you're anything but TERRIFIC!
I'm super excited that my brother and sister-in-law are expecting their first baby!  Baby Avery will be here any day now and Cooper is beyond excited...

...except that he keeps asking if he can drop baby Avery...

...we're working on that...

Anyways, here are a few pictures from the baby shower we threw for her at the church.  Theme? Simple and dainty, just like sweet baby girls!  I was worried it would turn out too "blah," but I was pleasantly surprised!

Our church fellowship hall is huge, so it's kinda hard to make a shower feel cozy!  We put a round table just inside the door for people to drop of diapers in the diaper pail with a little note of encouragement for those 2 a.m. diaper changes.
 My school friends did this for me when I had Cooper and I absolutely loved reading them all!

I made a little framed note to go with it to explain everything.  Grab that here!

I love how all of the baby's breath turned out!
Pink Fabric: Hobby Lobby, current
Lace Trim: Hobby Lobby, current
Bucket: Hobby Lobby, current

At the last minute, we dug out some kids books to add as decorations.  Between a few people's stashes, we found some perfect ones that were vintage and muted.  But we also found these which were perfect for Miss Avery Madeline!

See what I mean? Diaper notes never disappoint...never!


Here's the food table...pre food!
Gray/White Fabric: Hobby Lobby
Doilies, varying sizes: Amazon

Thanks to my mom-in-law for making the runners and napkins to decorate!

I'm completely obsessed with fabric swags these days.  I used them in my classroom, for this shower, and I'm making one for Cooper's party.  You just get so much bang for your buck!  This is literally left over scraps of fabric and an extra roll of the lace ribbon!  I cut up the lace ribbon to script her name on the burlap banner!  So simple, so cute, so cheap!


On the menu...our shower was at 10 a.m. so we did brunch!

Breakfast casserole muffins...
Yogurt parfaits (Greek Gods Honey & Strawberry yogurt with a raspberry on top)...thanks to my old teammate for introducing me to this yummy cuteness.  Cups are plastic shot glasses with tiny "silver" spoons...both from Amazon!
Grapes and chocolate covered strawberries...
And, of course, strawberry cupcakes with white pearls for decoration!

Here's the drink table...
Faux-Mosas (Orange Juice & Sprite) and Raspberry water were perfect for our brunch!

We used left over baby's breath to make a wreath to hide the brown brick :)
 I just love the arrow pattern the napkins made.  Those are the $1 packs of napkins at Walmart, just alternated.  Who needs expensive cute napkins?

So, I might be a little in love with mason jars.  They just make me happy.  They are so cheap and you can do so many things with them.  I layered left over scraps of pink fabric, lace ribbon and teeny tiny twine and I love the way they turned out!

And a HUGE thanks to my talented sister-in-law for making the beautiful and yummy sugar cookies for our party!  They were perfect!

She just started filling orders from her home, so check out her Facebook page here if you are local!  She'll be checking into shipping soon!
During the week, I teach firsties.  On the weekend, I teach preschoolers at church during Sunday School.  I absolutely love teaching a different age at church because it keeps everything so fresh!  Plus, I just adore preschoolers.  It's just the best age.  And especially since Cooper is almost-- *gasp*-- a preschooler, I'm really beginning to appreciate this age group!

This is my 12th year or so teaching this class at church and while I love it very much, the curriculum we order is sometimes really great.

And sometimes, it's really awful.

So, over the years, I've written a few good units to fill in the gaps when I don't like what I'm given to teach.  The Fruit of the Spirit was one of the first units I wrote and it's seriously my favorite.  Take a look at one of my favorite fruit of the spirit activities for preschoolers.

The fruit of the Spirit is perfect for Sunday School, and it's perfect for character education in public school...no need to freak out about teaching these fruits in public schools!  I use these words all the time with my firsties.  They may not realize they are getting some Sunday School in first grade....but they are.  One of my favorite ways to weave in the fruits is with my group plants on their shelves.

We are just now getting to do this unit in Sunday School.  Here's a look at our fruit of the Spirit activities!

We start each Sunday School session with a Bible story about our fruit for the week.  We learn the motion to go with that fruit and sing our fruit of the spirit song.



Then, we head to the table and work on our Fruit of the Spirits book...

This Sunday, we learned about joy.  So, we read last week's page, "I have love" to review and practice our early reading skills! :)

Then, we traced the word "joy" in yellow--of course!

Then, we made our real lemon "show joy" by cutting a smile wedge slice out of it!  We used yellow craft paint to "stamp" the lemon smile on our paper.  We practiced saying the word each time we stamped the fruit.

My preschoolers always love stamping these fruits.  And I love when the fruits match their corresponding words when we stamp....the lemons smile for joy, the strawberries stamp hearts for love....

After we work on our books comes the best part...the taste test!  We each try out our fruit for the week to see if we like it.  The rule is...you must try and see and you must say and act out the fruit of the spirt for the week with each bite!  Lemons are especially fun!

And since Cooper is in my class now, you get the full show of what his taste test was....

"Joy!"  I'll just go ahead and add here that he refused to put his fingers on his cheeks to say joy because he didn't want to get his face sticky.  He is SO my child...
But they just light up saying, "joy" each time they licked the lemon!  So fun to watch!

After our stamp and snack time, we practice our Bible verse and then match our fruits.  Since we are only finished with two fruits, we are just matching our word cards this way for now.  Halfway through the unit, we will switch over to matching the entire verse, "But the fruit of the spirit is...." with the Bible verse cards.  It's amazing how fast they learn to "read" these fruits!  After we match, we point and chant our fruit of the spirit song again....repetition is the name of the game for the littles, isn't it?

I have also added some sentence frame cards for older kiddos to lead discussions on how they show these fruits or for writing about each fruit in their books. Over 50 pages of materials for this unit!  This fruit of the Spirit activities unit is always a favorite of mine and the preschoolers, but I'm especially excited to teach it with my own sweet child in class with me!

And a little video of my own kiddo (for permission reasons!) saying all of the Fruits of the Spirit with the motions!

Setting up writers' workshop at the beginning of the year in first grade takes lots of patience!  Here's a look at how I get started with strong writers at the beginning of the year!

We started our first week with a Frozen Time Capsule activity and a little visit from Olaf in a {{chilly}} ice chest!  And even if you've already been in school a bit, it's not too late.  Last year was my first year with this activity, and my kids just loved seeing the changes they made during the year!  Such an engaging way to get kids to want to start writing!

The second day of school, we wrote about what they wanted to learn in first grade {This paper and simple activity is in my first Unit}.  Really, this is just a preassessment for me.  You can use any prompt at the beginning of the year.  I took up the papers when they were finished and sorted the papers into four stacks:
1) Super low (below basic) writers,
2) low (basic) writers,
3) proficient writers and
4) advanced writers.

This is not a formal assessment...it's just a quick, gut reaction on where each kid is at the beginning of the year before they get much help from me.

Once I have my piles, I divide each pile into 4 groups {pink, orange, green and 1...I usually have a yellow group instead of a 1 group, but I could not find any of these silly stickers that had four colors this year!!!!  GRRR!  So, I had to settle for a "1" group! :)

Anyways...I give each colored dot a friend from my lowest stack until I'm out of lows....then I pass out the proficient stacks to each dot....then the advanced ones.  This gives me 4, heterogenous groups to work with.  My groups aren't on anything fancy....just the ol' handwritten index card with dots.  But it works!!  Monday-Thursday I conference with one of these colored dot groups.  Fridays I can conference with an additional group, a different group {like more intervention for my lows} or it just leaves it open to not conference and do some whole group writing activities.  I've used this system for most of my 10 years teaching and I love it!
Why heterogenous groups?  Mainly, it's a time thing.  If I conferenced with all of my low writers one day, it would take for. ever. to finish our conferences because they need so much from me.  If I conferenced with all of my highs one day, I'd be done in 5 seconds.  So, I mix it up so that I use up just the write amount of time conferencing!

Even though I do all of that pre assessing stuff right off the bat, I don't actually start full writers' workshop until the 2nd week of school.  We spend the first 6 days charting what good writers do on our pencil chart!

The format is the same as Writers Workshop: mini-lesson and model write, and then independent writing time, but instead of just journal writing, we work on Silly Sentences!!

These might be my favorite thing ever!  I loved this for my ELL babies!  They have green, yellow and red cards.  They turn over one color of each card and try to turn it into a complete sentence.

So, "penguin swims school" becomes, "The penguin swims at the school." On the first day we do them altogether.  I turn over 3 cards on our ELMO and we write the sentence together on the board and their dry erase boards.  Then, as with the Gradual Release of Responsibility, they begin to write the sentence we discuss together on their boards instead of just copying.  We do this on the first and the second day.

By the third or fourth day, they are ready to write with partners.  So, with partners they turn over the cards and write their complete sentences.  Even though the school I'm at now is not as high ESL as before, this activity was still so good for these babies too.  Each day we focused on a new mechanics skill from our What Good Writers Do pencil anchor chart and focused on that with our silly sentences.  We also were able to talk about whether the sentence could be a fiction or non-fiction sentence.  And this class enjoyed trying to turn over the cards out of order....green, red, yellow instead of green, yellow, red.  {I made my ELL babies do it in order to help them with syntax.}  It was an extra challenge for these kids to think about what order to arrange the parts of the sentence.

My kids BEG to do silly sentences every year!  It's such a fun way to start off the year with some serious mechanics practice!  And it's the first thing that goes in my writing literacy station too!

Grab your own copy for your ELL babies---or non-ELL babies too!  Or get my entire Common Core Unit 1 which includes this activity and other writing activities!

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