Book Fairy (and a Little Moving Fairy, too!)

I am feeling so bad in a naughty kind of way!  I am supposed to be moving across the street.  My husband has been working so hard at getting the house ready for us.  I have been procrastinating and saying I won't be ready to do anything until school is out.  I sit on the porch with my laptop facing my new house and as soon as I see my husband coming I close the lid and rush inside and look like I'm really busy cleaning and packing!  School is out...I should be packing.  I'm thinking of fairies!

I have always had a fascination with fairies.  When I was a little girl we would visit my grandparents in St. Louis every two years.  They would visit us in Michigan every other year, or that's what I remember!  My grandparent's house was magical.  There was an attic to explore, fireflies galore and my grandmother was an artist who was especially good with pottery.  She had her own wheel and kiln.  

Made by my grandmother October 1972

When we visited we would get to make "stuff" with her.  Now my grandmother didn't have a great way with kids, but she did try hard to connect with us. Her only child had blessed her with six grandchildren.  Pottery was one connection and the other...fairies!  Her fairy would leave candy for us under our pillows.  Usually once a day we would squeal in delight at finding a treat from the fairy.  When she came to visit us the fairy would travel along and leave us candy in a dish at our house.  It wasn't lots of candy just one small piece for each of us.

Made by me July 1971

                                                                 My mom continued the tradition with her grandchildren and even had a special dish with a fairy sitting on the side.  That fairy would travel with my mom and bring one small treat for each grandchild each day. My grandmother and mother are gone, but I love special memories  that seal in my mind very special times.


I have a fairy that shows up in my classroom.  I actually have several fairies, but my favorite one is the  Book Fairy.  That fairy shows up around each child's birthday and leaves a wrapped book in the birthday child's browsing box.  The child gets to open it and no matter what we're doing we stop, drop and read the book the fairy left.  Sometimes books have sat in the browsing box until the end of the day before someone spies it!  The gifted child gets to take the book home to share with their family before returning it to the classroom library. These books become favorites and even hoarded treasures of the recipient!

I thought I had a picture of these wrapped up with
gold paper and bows.  They are always wrapped
before being placed in the browsing boxes.

The inside cover has a tag from the Book Fairy commemorating
the birthday child.

Instead of preparing for a move today, I have been working on making bookplate stickers for the Book Fairy.  I've decided that the  Book Fairy can come more often than just birthdays.  I think I'll put out a welcome mat, so she'll know she can come for any special occasion!  The fairy uses bonus points from  the book orders, donated books from parents, or even books picked up at Goodwill.  It doesn't cost a lot of money, but children learn that books are magical!  You can get my Book Fairy materials by clicking the link or buy it at my TPT store!  It doesn't bother me if you want to buy it, but why not just get it for free!

THE LINK

I can't wait until Friday when my Moving Fairy is coming to help me get my kitchen ready to move into.  I bet you wish you had one of these...She's magical and sometimes she shows up with coffee!!
Here comes my husband again...I gotta go!!

Print these out on Avery 8164 shipping labels. They'll look fairly
lovely in the book!

P.S.  Laurie, I think I did it!! Click on the Chickadee to find out!!

True Confessions

True confessions:  
1.  I'm still in my pajamas. (It is 10:40 in the morning!)
2. I love summer vacation...Even though my first graders believe I think it is the worst time of       the year!
3.  I'm eating cookies for breakfast.

I'm also playing with my new "toy"  My Memories  -digital scrap-booking software.  I think I'm in love.  I used to spend hours scrap-booking in my basement.  I love the books I've made, but I do have a hard time keeping my pictures organized and I don't like the mess I create and have to pick up.  I happened to win the My Memories Suite recently from one of my favorite bloggers...Snickety Things.  Renonda has helped me in so many ways and she's made my blogging experience worthwhile! I wasn't too sure how I'd feel about scrap-booking on my computer, but I'm loving it!
If you want to try it you can use my code...I get some freebies if you do....So go ahead make my day!
STMMMS20473





Here it is my first attempt at digital scrap-booking:

I'm off to clean my kitchen and sew a baby bib for a special first time mama!  Guess what...It has owls on it!

Butterflies and the Winner is....

Having a give away with Dana at  Fun in 1st Grade was well...fun!  We had a hoot dreaming up a great way to celebrate 80 followers together.  That celebration is over but I'm sure there is a party going on somewhere else right now!  The winner of the Sharpies Glam pack is...  Jana...Who should start blogging!! and Ashlee at Sweet Seconds wins the gift card to Starbucks!  Go check Ashlee out and follow her if you like sweet things...Her blog is Sweeeet!!



Ashlee just started blogging and would love you to follow her!


I hope you will fly over to see Kimberly at First in Maine.  She has a bookmark she is sharing to keep her students engaged with books and learning all summer.  I like it so much I'm sending it to my former and future first graders.
Remember my caterpillars?  Yesterday before church I was happy to find this.....

Laurie at Chickadee Jubilee....He is covered in polka dots!!

He crawled all over me for a long time!

How'd you sneak in here?  I found him at a
High School Open House.  I wanted to
take him home, but SOMEONE said, "NO!"
How could anyone say no to this face??!!

I'm enjoying my first Monday of Summer Vacation with an extra cup of coffee and watching the birds flocking to my feeders. Hope your day is filled with all the things you love!

Summer Reading...Bring it on!

I have been walking around for several hours now writing blog posts in my head.  We ate on paper plates summer china, so I could start getting my thoughts down quickly before they disappeared.  As soon as I read Clutter-Free Classroom's Linky post my mind has been racing. Getting lost in a good book is my favorite summer time activity!  The link challenge:  Share the titles of books you will read this summer!

I was recently asked to teach literature to 7th and 8th graders two afternoons a week. Is that a dream job, or what?  First graders all morning and then reading young adult novels with teenagers in the afternoon...Life doesn't get any better! The young adult fiction category is one of my favorite groups of reads.  Before having a teenager I never would have wanted to spend very much time with a whole group of them.  I thought they were rather intimidating.  I've gradually gotten to know this special breed of humans and have found them to be humorous, imaginative, and hungry for adults to talk to.  The best thing about spending time with them is that I get to decide on the reading list of books that we read together and books that they get to choose from independently.  Here are three of my favorite young adult reads:

The Giver

Lizzy Bright and
the Buckminster Boy

Life as
We Knew It

These are three books by authors who have won awards and have other books written in their own special style.  I hope that when My 7th and 8th graders read these books they'll want to read more by these same authors.

Here are some young adult books I plan to read at this beach....

  

From my 80s Giveaway, I know most of you may remember being a teenager better than I!  Please leave me a comment about a book that you think I should read this summer and include in my curriculum next fall!

I'm also planning on participating with Heather of Heather's Heart in her summer book study of Conscious Discipline.  I'm waiting anxiously for my book to arrive in the mail, so I can get started.

 My summer reading will include reading some material by some of my favorite authors...YOU!  I love reading your blog posts. They make me cry, laugh and cheer!  If you have read this far, thank you for being an inspiration to me and following along in this journey of joy! 

Blue-Who! End of the Year...

I'm feeling a bit sad and blue....or perhaps red would be a better description of how I'm feeling...Red as in SUN-BURN!  Today one of my owlet's moms paired up with another mom and hosted a pool party for the first grade class.  I spent a lot of time in the pool playing, splashing and laughing with my wonderful former students!  I did announce towards the end of the party that I had failed every student and the whole group would have to repeat first grade.  Yes...This group is that amazing.

We had a half day of school before heading out into the blistering Michigan sun!  We had an ice-cream party to celebrate reaching our reading goal for May, did some money work, read a story about a boy who drags a doughnut through town, which ends up drawing quite a large following, before he finally stops and eats it!
 I then read this poem I had written for my kiddos while shedding a tear or two...

Graphic by KPMDoodles.blogspot.com

I placed a copy of the poem on a clipboard that I had customized for each child.  My kids were fascinated by highlighters, so I gave them each a new highlighter, paper and a plastic back-scratcher, too!

From blah...

to wow!

End of year gift ready to be delivered!

So, summer is here and I am looking forward to a bit of rest and relaxation.  I love linking up with other bloggers.  Have you checked this one out?  Jeannie at Kindergarten Lifestyle has made it so easy to link-up and share how YOU know when it's summer.  Along with my sunburn...

Time to find some Aloe Vera and soothe the skin I am in...Welcome summer!  Don't forget to enter my giveaway....CLICK HERE TO ENTER!

It Was Acceptable in the 80s Give Away!

Do you remember the 80s?  I remember them fondly because great things happened for me in that decade!  I graduated and got my first teaching job in the 80s.  I met and married the love of my life in the 80s.  Here’s a list of some more firsts for me in the 80s:  first car, first house, first cat, first garden, first motorcycle ride, I could go on and on, but I won’t!

Today I spent some time at a car show with my husband.  I’m not crazy about car shows, but I love spending time with my husband and watching people.  I kept my eyes open for cars from the eighties and this was my favorite one:

Here it is....The Delorean!  If you can't remember the 80s
you can get this car travelling 88 miles an hour and go back in time!

That is another thing that I loved about the 80s…Back to the Future and other great movies!

 Now I have a great move for you!  I have teamed up with Dana Lester at Fun in 1st Grade for an 80s Give Away to celebrate 80 followers together. We have 8 ways for you to enter and we are each giving away prizes to four lucky winners!  You can enter with me and then be sure to go visit Dana for another chance to win!  Who wouldn’t want the 80s Glam pack of Sharpies?  I would like to enter to get the 8 dollar gift card to Starbucks!  Don’t wait 8 minutes or even 8 seconds to enter below.  I can hardly wait to see what your favorite thing from the 80s is! 

Good luck to everyone who enters...May the force be with you!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

A Friend for Arnie...The End!

This student is getting ready to remove the eyes so her
doughnut doesn't have to watch as it is eaten!

Oscar the doughnut says, "Hello!"

Where ever you celebrated National Doughnut Day, I hope it was filled with holes!  In first grade, my owlets had a hole lot of fun.  After reading Arnie The Doughnut, we created friends for him.  The day was just not long enough to fit in all the doughnutty fun that I planned. Is  there anything better than a well planned day were everything goes just right?  I don't think so!  A momentary glitch with the paper plates was quickly remedied and didn't even cause more than a moment of stress!  In case you missed it here is the link to my Arnie the Doughnut Unit...You can buy it on TPT, too!  It is new and improved, after I figured out some mistakes working through it with my owlets!

Good bye, Oscar!

Is it just me, or have you noticed that students seem to be distancing themselves from each other and you in anticipation of the coming changes?  I think we underestimate the stress that the end of the year causes in young students' lives.  Yes, they should be excited to be moving on to the next grade.   Yes, they should be very excited about a whole three months of relaxation and fun.  Yes, they should be excited that teachers with high expectations are finally going to leave them alone!  But, I know that one of my students has been intentionally failing tests so that I'll have him repeat first grade!  Another student who is sweet and goodhearted is suddenly doing mean sneaky things to classmates.  Everyone's patience...yes even mine...is running thin.  In these last days or weeks I pray that you will have a kindness and understanding for your students who love you and may not be as excited about The End as you are.  For some this is a sad story...I hope that you are able to help them find some happiness in saying good-bye!