Balloon People

One of the best things about being a first grade teacher is having access to TONS of cool activities that you can bring home and do with your own kids.  There are so many teacher blogs out there...and that combined with Pinterest provides so many fun things you can do with your class and children.  The best part is that most of them are educational in some way and not only provide a craftivity but also a reading, writing, or math component.  Meet our "Balloon People"...a craft from one of the best bloggers in the world...Abby Mullins.

  

You use a balloon and her unit comes with printable facial features and feet templates.  You can also design your own.  Isaiah was adding hair to his guy.

Here's Ava's balloon girl.  They had a blast making them!

Two proud kids with their new creations.  We also printed off a mini book where the kids started to fill in things about their balloon person...likes/dislikes.  Ava does a great job spelling lots of sight words and uses inventive spelling for ones she doesn't know...although we do hear "Mom, Dad...how do you spell____."  Isaiah has been doing an amazing job with letter sounds.  When he writes words we tell him the sounds and then he as to think of the letter to write.  This little smarty has really surprised us lately.  He's been sounding out three letter words all by himself and has been writing them correctly!  So proud!

A little rest and relaxation with books.  If I remember correctly they were playing school and this was quiet time.

Isaiah was doing picture reading!  I told him that's what beginning readers do...they look at the pictures and tell the story in their own words.

This kid has been a reading champ lately!

Miss Violet having her "quiet time."  She's an amazing sleeper now at night.  I think we had a little colic going on for a while and that is now over.  She gets very upset if she's not in bed by 8 and gets grouchy when she's tired.  We do need to work on naps.  This kid prefers her swing and her swing only...I'm lucky if I can get a few catnaps in her crib.  We'll get there!  Just like Miss Ava when she was little! 

 

How can our littlest baby be 3 months next week?  Unreal how fast time goes.  She is more precious and lovable than we could have ever imagined. 

As promised weeks ago...here are some new pics of the furniture we got for the family room.  I've NEVER picked out a rug before but really like how the lighter color contrasts with the dark furniture.  It was time for a bigger couch with five in our family now!

The coffee table...Pottery Barn inspired...but cheaper!  It already looks distressed on top so I few more dents throughout the years will fit right in.

Here's the sofa table that sits behind the couch.  We have this by the kids art station and we use it to house some of the games...by some I mean a few of their favorites...the rest are still taking up the shelves by the fireplace.  I don't think anyone can ever have too much storage.

 

 

My Three Happy's:

1)  Seeing the cornstalks growing in the garden.  I love seeing all the other stuff too...but there's something fun about growing corn.  As they say "Knee high before the 4th of July"...I think we're on track.

2) Ava is now officially old enough to fit into Abercrombie Kids.  I was so excited that we went a little nuts with the purchases the other day.  A girl has gotta have lots of clothes...right?

3)My smiley Vee Vee...she has her grumpy moments...don't get me wrong...but this girl's smile is beyond adorable.  I love when she spots Ava and Isaiah.  She immediately smiles and starts to talk to them.  They carry on little conversations with her and it's so fun to watch.

 

My Favorite:

I love thunderstorms...not the scary ones with 70 mile per hour winds...but the nice quiet ones that rumble in the evenings or early mornings.  Call me crazy...but I think they're so cozy!