Five for Friday...ON TIME!!!

We are linking up with Doodle Bugs Teaching for her

and the best part is....we are actually on time!!!!  Woo hoo!!!!!  I swear, since having children I am always playing catch up!  Since Katie has 3 kiddos of her own she is always in the same boat.  We seem to always take turns texting each other to please turn on my computer because I am running late!!!

On to 5 for Friday!

1. Animal Talks Field Trip

We walk to the high school that is right by our school and the student naturalist have centers set up with their animals.  We get to rotate around learning about and touching the animals.  Weeeeelllll, let me clarify...the KIDS touch the animals!  Not this squeamish lady!!!!  We get to cross a really busy road on this walk and it is always hilarious as we hustle the children across.  

On a side note, I thought I was doing so good (I'm 8 1/2 months prego now) and truckin along as we walked to the high school.  THEN I hustled my little cherubs across the road, convinced 3 of my boys that I really would have a heart attack if they walked THAT close to the road, and told my little naughty of the year that if he didn't listen I WOULD call the principal to come and pick him up.  After that I lost all of my energy and started waddling like a VERY prego lady.  Doggonnit!!!!!!!

2. Jenna lost a tooth! 

 Katie's little cutie patootie lost another tooth and this picture is too adorable not to share!  Yay Jenna!!!

3. End of year ordering.
We always have to order our next year's supplies by the end of April.  We get $50 to spend now on things and then we can still check out our school credit cards at the beginning for whatever else we forgot, but this is the fun time for ordering! Plus I will be on maternity leave at the beginning of the year so I am trying to get everything ready ahead of time for my sub so that I will not be dragging 2- 2 year olds and a 2 month old up to school to try to get stuff ready!  (Just saying that amount of children and imagining bringing them up to school with me while trying to get stuff done strikes fear in my heart!!!) :)

4.  It is ALMOST May!!!!!!!

Had to share where both my calendar and Katie's calendar are right now!  We are SO close to May and an end of year countdown.  We have 1 more story in our reading book and one more spelling list to get through and then we can start the fun end of year stuff!  It always gets the kiddos motivated!  If you are looking for something fun to do with your kiddos at the end of the year check out our End of Year Fun unit on TPT!!

5. Indoor Recess

Boo hiss!  We were supposed to have some pretty decent weather and at the last minute we got rain!  Ugh! These little darlings need to be outside running!  Instead we are inside for recess.  It never fails in Katie's room that her kids sit right in front of her desk with the legos and argue over them the ENTIRE recess. AT least the next 4 days are supposed to be gorgeous!

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The Product Swap & Five for Friday a Wee Bit Late!! :)

It is time again for the Product Swap! Yay!!!! This is our 2nd time participating and it is just as fun as the first time around!

We were paired with Nicole Rios this time around too.

We were excited about this because she is so great and has such wonderful products!  We were so excited to get to review another one of her items! We chose to review Nicole's Multiplication- Circles and "Spring Things" Practice Book.  (Click on the product name or the picture of the cover to check it out on TPT!!)

This is a great packet!  We are so excited to get to use this with our 2nd graders because we are just about to start looking at multiplication with repeated addition!  This is such a great  resource because it really scaffolds their learning and gives them time to slowly move from looking at great examples of groups of pictures and then moving them to creating their own groups of pictures.
Here are some pics of how the book shows examples and then gradually releases the responsibility of creating the groups to the kiddos.  The packet even ends with a great and quick way to review what students have learned!

Katie has her very own 2nd grader at home and took this to her house to test drive with her son before we started it in class.  (He has been absolutely dying to learn how to multiply so he was very excited when she told him she was bringing this home!)  Here he is in action with Nicole's packet!

Don't forget, if you want to check out this AWE.SOME packet then just head over to TPT and you can grab your own!!!

We are also linking up with Doodle Bugs Teaching for Five for Friday!  A little bit late, but Katie was in charge of pics this week and on Friday her phone decided to become completely possessed!!!!!  She had to get a new phone and let her old one charge all night to get enough battery on it to transfer the pics from the evil phone to her laptop! :)

Here are 5 random things about our week!

 1. Brain Breaks....Thank heavens for these little bits of bribery!!   We can generally get our kiddos to work quietly for at least 15 minutes at a stretch if we tell them they can earn a brain break.  They are SUCH an active grade level this year that we sometimes feel desperate for anything that will allow them to concentrate for small stretches of time! :)  We love the Just Dance Disney on You tube.  Soooo easy to pull up and the kiddo love them. It might also be an absolute crack up for us to watch them get so into doing all the moves for a High School Musical song or Calling all the Monsters!  Soooooooo funny!!!  This pic is one of my favorite action shots!

2. Field Trip!!!!  We went to Science City this week and we always have either a picture of one of us on the bike or Katie in the Mister E Cafe looking like she is just a floating head. So we had to continue the tradition because the kiddos at school love it and so do Katie's kiddos at home!  (We really do also have pics of our kiddos enjoying the field trip too, this one was just the funniest!!!)

3. Inservice.....booo....hisss.....  Great info, but they added an extra session this year so we went to 1230.  Way too long for us when we are used to getting out at 1115 and heading straight to lunch!  ( Mind you we had snacks and drinks to keep are energy up but it just wasn't enough to last us through that last added hour!!)  So we had to console ourselves with one of our favorite inservice lunches!  We went to Jose Peppers and scarfed up some chips, salsa, and of course a Pollo Magnifico!  Yum!!!!

4. Measurement Mania

We are working on measurement right now and anything that involves our kiddos moving is always a hit!  Here is Katie's class in action checking out some measurement around her classroom.

5.  Electronics Party

One of the items that our kiddos can buy with their stars (our class behavior system) is an electronics party.  Such a big hit! They get to bring in any of their own school appropriate electronics and play them for an hour.  So easy to plan and no mess to clean up for us!  Love it!  This pic cracked us both up because for some reason or other almost half of Katie's class decided to take their electronics and camp out RIGHT in front of Katie's desk!  Mind you, they had the entire room to spread out in, but decided to squish themselves as close as they could to Katie's desk!  Go figure!!!!!

We also just finished our First Grade Common Core Math Vocabulary Cards and Posters.  We have these for 2nd grade and use them ALL the time!  Our first grade mentioned to us that they loved them and would love to have the first grade version for themselves.  So of course we got right to work!  We just finished them up and our first grade is already using them.  You can grab them at our TPT store!

We will also be having a giveaway on Facebook for our Common Core Second Grade Language Arts and Math Homework 4th Quarter Bundle that Nicole is reviewing and also a giveaway for our First Grade Common Core Math Vocabulary Cards and Posters!  So be on the lookout!

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Check Out These Great Giveaways!

I have spent WAY too much time entering giveaways today!!!!

Since we recently won a giveaway at this cute blog that we just found (Let's Get Fancy in First) I got bitten with the giveaway bug!  This pack that we won is adorable and ties in great with one of our spelling units!

  I am now up at night after my kiddos are in bed hogging the laptop from my hubby so that I can enter giveaways!  I so go in stages of entering giveaways!  I always want to enter all of them because there are such great things to win, but then I fight my exhaustion at the end of the day and it usually wins!  However, whenever we win something it revitalizes me to start entering again.  Which is actually a great thing for us because we end up discovering such great new blogs to start following!!

Here are some great bloggers having AMAZING giveaways right now!  Just click on their buttons to check out their giveaways!

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Let's Get Acquainted linky

We have seen these around for awhile and love reading other people's responses, but seem to run out of time (or energy!) to link up.  So we are finally linking up with Flying into First Grade's Let's Get Acquainted Linky.

Lisen
Favorite Place to Shop
My favorite store to shop at is Macy's.  I always find great deals there and am able to combine them with the coupons that I get in the mail from Macy's.  I really wouldn't want to pay the original price, but with all the deals and sales I can end up getting really great things for my whole family!

Favorite TV Show
Oh this is soooo hard to narrow down!  I have lots I love to DVR, but I think I will break the rules a LITTLE bit and tell you my faves that the hubby and I always save to watch together. (It is pretty rare that we find a show that we BOTH truly love watching!)
The Amazing Race, Swamp People, and American Pickers

Favorite Sweet Treat
I would say chocolate peanut butter ice cream is my guilty treat, but really at this point of my life it is anything that these two little bitties like and will share with me!  They are at the age when candy/treats can make them hop and down and dance with excitement so it is fun to share any treat I am getting!

Favorite Food
Mexican and especially Jose Peppers!  I could eat it ALL the time, but my hubby gets bored with it after a few visits and for some strange reasons wants to try other restaurants. What is that about??????  :)

Favorite Restaurant
See above!!!!

Katie
Favorite Place to Shop
I LOVE Target since you can get such great things there for reasonable prices. And, of course, you can't beat all the great finds from the dollar section!

Favorite TV Show
Big Bang Theory. Honestly, I don't really watch t.v. After having kids, I found it very frustrating that I couldn't follow a series since I would so often miss episodes (don't suggest dvr'ing it....I live in ancient times where we don't have that....my times are so ancient that we don't even have cable! *gasp*!). I only watch the re-runs of Big Bang Theory and I have a few seasons that my husband bought for me. This show cracks me up!!

Favorite Sweet Treat
Reeses Peanut butter cups. Do I even need to explain this one?

Favorite Food
The Polo Magnifico from Jose Peppers. To. Die. For. I can't even explain how yummy it is. There is nothing like it anywhere else that I have been to. It has shredded chicken in a flour tortilla that is fried, then baked. They cover it with cheese and a super yummy sauce. It has more calories and fat in it than I would ever want to know.

Favorite Restaurant
Jose Peppers. See above :)

P.S. I promise Lisen and I didn't fill this out together and we have no connections to Jose Peppers!
P.P.S But we DO dine there together for just about every inservice lunch time!!!!!!!!




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April Currently

We are linking up with Farley for her April Currently! Love these!
Lisen

Listening- My girls are so stinking sweet with each other right now!  They will share so nice and run to get their sister's lovey if one of them is sad!

Thinking- Lucas arrives June 3rd and I might need to borrow crib #3 from Katie since my girls don't think they can climb out of their cribs ( hallelujah!!!!) and are still using theirs!

Wanting- Sooooooo not realistic with 22 month old twins but a girl can dream! :)

Needing- I swear pre children my home and classroom were so organized and now I feel good if I get laundry done and actually put away and make it to school on time!  Ahhhhhh!

Advice- Katie and I both loved reading other people's blogs for forever before we finally took the plunge and started our own.  We are both SO glad that we finally did.  We have met so many great bloggy friends and love having an outlet to share what goes on with our classrooms!  It really pushes us to be better teachers!  Don't be intimidated..just do it!


Katie

Happy April!

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