Kindergarten Open House

I thought I would share a few pictures from my open house at school. The theme was Kinder "garden." There were also a lot of photos up of things the kids have done throughout the year, but I tried not to share anything too personal.


These sunshines are one of my favorite crafts we made. The students traced and cut their own hands. It took forever, but was so worth it!

This bulletin board has lima beans that we "planted" in a baggie with a wet paper towel. They actually grew really well this way. Most had roots grow and one even got to the point of growing leaves. After open house these got sent home to be planted in dirt so they could grow more. *hint: if you do lima beans this way watch out for mold...don't ask me how I know this!
The students LOVED planting flowers and watching them grow. On the board behind the plants are pictures they drew while observing their seeds and plants. They drew a picture the day we planted, after a week, and after 2 weeks. The students also put sequence cards for how a plant grows in order.

We learned a little about symmetry to make these butterflies.

Another one of my favorites. These sunflowers have a clock face as their center. The students got to pick what time their clock was (we know time by the hour) and had to write that time on one of the leaves.

Oh Blog how I have missed you!

I started teaching kindergarten full time in November and since then life has been absolutely nuts. I haven't picked up a stamp since I started teaching and honestly I haven't missed stamping much...sad huh? I just haven't thought much about it. Life goes through seasons and right now this season is full of kinder lesson plans and crafts that have supplies like construction paper and tempera paint instead of cardstock and ink. And I love it! I do use my artistic side when teaching. I love coming up with crafts and projects that kids can do and have fun with. I thought I would share the gift my kids made their moms for Mother's Day (I don't think any moms will stumble on my blog ruining the secret :) ) I bought kitchen towels (the flour sack kind) and had the kids put their handprints on them in acrylic paint. They got to choose colors, these two just happen to be aqua blue.


















This poem went with the gift:
Sometimes you get discouraged
Because I am so small,
And always leave my fingerprints
On furniture and walls.
But everyday I am growing
--I'll be grown up someday
And all these tiny handprints
Will simply fade away.
So here's a final handprint
Just so you can recall,
Exactly how my fingers looked
When I was very small.
I love you!

Leadership

I have been thinking a lot lately about leadership. God has been taking me on this journey of learning to be a leader, and not just any old kind of leader, but a leader that is confident because my strength is in Him. This relates to my teaching, my apartment manager position, a few ministries at church, and other areas of life. With all learning and growing experiences, the pain and struggles have come full force and I realize over and over how hard it is to be out in the front leading. I saw this quote on a blog I stumbled on and it really made me think.

"It is not the critic who counts: not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles or where the doer of deeds could have done better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood, who strives valiantly, who errs and comes up short again and again, because there is no effort without error or shortcoming, but who knows the great enthusiasms, the great devotions, who spends himself for a worthy cause; who, at the best, knows, in the end, the triumph of high achievement, and who, at the worst, if he fails, at least he fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who knew neither victory nor defeat."-Theodore Roosevelt

I just want to add something my pastor said in a sermon a few months back. This is my remembering of it so it might not be an exact quote--"God calls us to be obedient, not necessarily to be successful" Whether we succeed or fail, if we are following hard after God we are on the right path.

eP friend!!!

When Joy first showed me the Changito stamps that they were going to sell in the eP store I knew I would be hooked. I mean, who can resist a cute little monkey? Stampendous has not failed to to impress me. Each time they have new Changito stamps I fall more in love! Summer is basically over, but I thought I could still use the Changito Chef one more time. Isn't he cute??? The sentiment is called Chef's Choice--Let's Ketchup . The sentiment is actually only 2 lines on the stamp, but I used a marker to ink the sections so it would fit on the circle.

This simple card is my first sample as the eP friend of the week! I have to tell you that Joy and Daisy are my friends in real life as well as through their store. It is hard NOT to point you to their store for crafting supplies when I share my creations because I love their stuff, their prices, and their customer service is great too! So check out my blog this week for more cards and projects made with the fun products you can buy at Eclectic Paperie! I have some very fun projects to share!

DETAILS
stamps: Changito Chef, Chef's Choice--Let's Ketchup
ink: Palette Hybrid--Noir Black, Copic Markers
paper: Stampin' Up
other: stampin' up circle and scallop circle punches

Kids Class round 2

The school I substitute at has an enrichment program for the elementary students. The enrichment classes meet one hour, one day a week, for 5 weeks. Students get to choose from many different fun classes. I taught a craft class for 2nd and 3rd graders last spring and decided to do that same class (tweaked a little) this fall.

In April I showed this picture of the covered notebook and beaded pen that the kids did the first class. I hope to do this again, but I learned that this is way too much for 12 young girls to all finish in an hour!

I also plan on doing cards one class, altering a wooden picture frame, making clear marble magnets and decorating t-shirts. Should be a lot of fun and I hope to take more pictures this time around.

One Touch

I was standing at the checkout counter at Target searching my purse for enough money to pay when the cashier started talking about reading "the book"...I thought he was talking to someone else until he kept talking and I looked up and realized he was looking at my shirt that had a cross on it. He said something about how he had read part of the Bible once and he had a sadness in his eyes when he said that he wasn't where he should be, he wasn't living life how he should. I have to admit that I was a little bit at a loss for words. I don't know exactly what I said, (later I thought about all of the things I "should" have said), but I tried to share in the minute that I had that no matter how far away we are from God, He is always there waiting for us to return. There is no place that we can go that is too far for God to rescue us from. He just looked at me like he couldn't believe it and told me he was too far away. I left that day with a sadness in my heart for the lack of hope in this young man's life.

In the Bible Jesus often went to those that others considered "hopeless," people that probably had lost hope themselves, and He healed them. He often healed their physical ailments, but He also healed their spiritual ailments. There was no one too dirty, too sinful, too hopeless to heal.
He still heals today.

Nicole C Mullen was another one of the singers/speakers at the Women of Faith conference. One of the songs she performed was called "One Touch." It is a song about the story from Luke 8:43-48, where a woman who had been struggling with a bleeding problem for 12 years reached through a crushing crowd just to touch the hem of Jesus' garment and be healed. But the song isn't just about that Bible story, it is also about people today. People who are pushed down by their issues and are longing for some hope. Reach out and touch him, He is right there waiting, He will make you whole again.

Click to listen to ONE TOUCH by Nicole C Mullen