Really?

I ate breakfast, lunch, and dinner in my office at home....


....I had a mini melt at around 11:00 when I realized I made a mistake...


....I haven't spoken to Mark all day with the expectation of "I'm thirsty," or "My wrists are killing me!"


....I haven't showered...yes a fact which I am severely embarrassed to admit...


....my poor puppy has been whining for me all day....


....I have been sitting in my little office for 12 hours straight...


BUT.....THE YEARBOOK IS DONE!!!!!!!! 


It feels unbelievable to me. I think once I go to the doctors and am diagnosed with Carpal Tunnel, it will feel real then. There is an insane weight lifted off of me...that's probably the 20 pound pile of baby photos and candid pictures I have been getting since January and have FINALLY finished going through. 


I have odds and evens to finish up, but to me it's done! The rest is a piece of cake.


Speaking of cake...I am going to go shower to feel like a human again and have a giant piece of the cake that Mark got me. When I asked what the occasion was for such a treat, he said "It's a I'm sorry your hands will probably fall off due to the yearbook cake."


He's so charming. 

Fast and efficient!

Those two words describe Lauren over at

I asked her to design some food/drink clip art for me and she did a FABULOUS job. She was so considerate and nice to work with it. She was also precise and made sure she knew my vision and what I wanted. The turnover was super fast. I was hoping for my own selfish reasons the pack would be ready for the weekend, so I could work on some combination activities for my kiddos and sure enough it was!

Here is a picture of what she did:

HOW ADORABLE IS IT? Exactly what I wanted. Teaching combinations is somewhat challenging for 3rd graders. They have been very open and aware of what they want to work on before FCAT and one of the skills they wanted to review before our BIG test was combinations. I ALWAYS use food related word problems for combinations because that seems to be the most applicable for them. The problem is, I can never find the images I need. Lauren has saved me! 

I have bought several things from her store before and have always been thrilled. My kiddos think her stuff is adorable which is certainly a compliment to her. They are brutally honest. :) Make sure you check out her store. Thanks again Lauren! 

Spring break is over my friends

As I sit here and munch on cereal, I'm forced to acknowledge that my spring break is in its mere, final hours. Boy, that was fast. I am ready to get back to work though. I miss my kiddos like CRAZY and all of their charming antics! 


I wish I could say I had a lot of down time. I did here or there. My main goal was to put a dent in my yearbook "homework." I did Friday night when I sat in my office from 5pm-2am working on all things yearbook. I also worked on it for 5 hours yesterday and 10 hours during the whole week. I'm so ready for this thing to be done! I'm about 80% of the way there. 


There were a few things that kept me going during these marathon yearbook sessions....


First off...

Thank you Yummy Earth for such a wonderful gift. I killed this whole bag Friday night and then I hated those little bears for the rest of the night....the hate has since surpassed.

I also love Sweet Leaf Raspberry Tea.

Obsessed is more the word for this drink. 

and lastly....

OMG, if you haven't tried these and you like hot, TRY THEM! They are fabulous. Mark and I often argue about who will hold the bag when we open these babies up. I will forewarn you they turn your fingers orange so eat them in the comfort of your house next to the kitchen sink. Thank you comfort food for making the yearbook more enjoyable!

Mark and I are going to look at a condo today. We are taking the first (baby) steps in looking for a place to buy. We're not really house kinda people...I wonder what that says about us? I'm excited, yet anxious. Looking at places, the paperwork, etc, etc...YIKES, more things to deal with right now. I'm already tired thinking about it, BUT it needs to be done. We have been renting for years and now is the time to buy. 

I don't really have much to say in terms of teaching. So I will leave you with a family photo that Mark's mom just recently gave us. It's from Christmas and everyone is smiling. When I say everyone I mean Mark. Usually the camera gets him with his mouth wide open like he's catching flies. Even little Penny was cooperative. :) ICK, notice how short I am? And I am standing on my tippy toes.....

How can it be Thursday?

My spring break is coming to an end. Where did the time go? Earlier in the week I was feeling lucky to be on spring break but now I'm feeling like the UNlucky one with majority of you guys about to embark on your break. :)


I did manage to get some things done this week...


I created some worksheets to help my kiddos with composing/decomposing shapes. This concept is pretty tricky, especially if you have some kiddos who aren't spatial. We will work on these when we get back to school to give them some extra practice before FCAT.

I also created a sorting activity for parallel, intersecting, and perpendicular lines...

...a sorting activity for perimeter...

...a sorting activity for time...

...and an "I Have Who Has?" game for elapsed time. 

Not too bad for the week but I wanted to get more done. All of these items are in my TpT store and TN shop. I am currently having a sale over at TN. Check it out!

Lorraine over at 

is hosting a great linky party for blogs that are grades 3-5. Naturally this thrills me because I teach 3rd. :) Thanks Lorraine for hosting a great party. 

Off to go watch TV and master the art of doing nothing. :) 

Donors Choose

Like every other teacher, I too have a project on Donors Choose which I desperately need funded in order to get the point I need to post another grant, plus my students would LOVE the materials I requested. The link to my teacher page on Donors Choose is on the right hand side of my blog. :)


Currently, Donors Choose is matching every dollar donated to grants. How awesome is that?

Happy Spring Break Sale!

I am currently having a sale in my TN Shop! :)

10% off everything. Enjoy!

The longest post in the world to explain the big mistake

I made a BIG mistake this past week.


HUGE. MISTAKE. 


I went to Books-A-Million..........TWICE.


Yes, twice. (shivers)


I first went Wednesday night. My kiddos have gotten into the "Geronimo Stilton" series and they were begging me to get more. I only had about 6 of them and they had read them all. 

Sure. No problem.


I had a plan for myself. I would go into the store with tunnel vision. I wouldn't look around or browse the aisles, especially the "new" section. I kept hearing Mark's voice in my head, "WE CAN'T FIT ANYMORE BOOKS IN YOUR CLASSROOM TANYA!!" 


I had my game face and Cubs baseball hat on. I pulled it tightly over my face in hopes that it would block my eyes from darting to shelf to shelf and opened the front door of the store.


"Walk FAST, Tanya," I said to myself. "Go, go, go......but wait, what is that display of Dr. Seuss books over there?" 


NO YOU HAVE ENOUGH DR. SEUSS BOOKS! JUST KEEP WALKING. I sniffled a bit in disappointed but kept going.


After what felt like an hour walk to the middle of the store, I finally arrived at the kids' chapter books section. 


I suddenly realized my plan was flawed!


How many do I get???????


I never thought of that!


This dang series has close to 50 books in it...in addition to special editions....in addition to Geronimo's sister, Thea who has her own series....in addition to some spin off character named "Creepella" who has her own series!!!


I was beginning to hyperventilate. 


My gut was telling me to take my arm and slide it across the shelf holding these books and watch them all fall into my cart. 


And then I heard it......Mark's voice. "WE CAN'T FIT ANYMORE BOOKS IN YOUR CLASSROOM, TANYA!!!"




He's right ok....I'll get 3....well 7......ok 10 13. I picked the ones that looked the best and headed for the checkout. 


SUDDENLY I felt a violent gravitation pull to the children's picture books section.


NO. I. CAN'T. 


well ok I can....


"Tanya, you will just LOOK." That's it. Then you will leave.


Ok, I can do this.
BUT WHAT IS THIS? LIBRARY MOUSE HAS A NEW BOOK!!!!!!!!!!


I. LOVE. LIBRARY. MOUSE.


If you aren't familiar with this series, please get familiar ASAP. 

My kids ADORE this series. We have read all of them. In fact, Mark read the last one when he came to visit earlier in the year. Even he enjoys them.


So naturally I had to get the new one. It was a basic life necessity. 

And I wasn't worried about Mark because he is a fan too. 

Although it's a hardcover. YIKES on the price. That fact lasted literally 2 seconds in my head but then I was over it. THERE WAS ONE COPY AND IT WAS ALL MINE.

I know I should have left....

....and been satisfied with my great find.....

but....

.....I kept looking.

WHAT IS THIS? A NEW MIXED UP FAIRY TALE!!!!!!!!!

ARE YOU KIDDING ME?

WHY IS THIS HAPPENING TO ME?

It's called "The 3 Little Aliens and the Big Bad Robot."

IT'S AWESOME. 

After hugging it for 20 minutes I put it into my cart. Another hardcover...oh life is so unfair.

NOW TANYA YOU ARE LEAVING!!

Then I remembered that the new "My Weider School" book came out earlier in February but when I went to go get it a few days after its release date, it wasn't there and I had several disappointed students in my class. 

Go ahead Tanya and look because it's not going to be there. 

Of course, it was. My cheapest purchase though.....$4.00. I breathed a sign of relief. No problem there.

Then I ran to the checkout. LITERALLY RAN. Several people turned their heads as the sound of my cart speed past them, but I had to get out before I lost my mind with excitement. 

Library Mouse saved my life with Mark. He was so excited that I found a new one that he didn't realize the other 437 books sitting in the bag. He did however make me promise to hold onto the book and save it for when he comes to read at the end of the year. *sign* Okay.

Here is a picture of my finds:

Penny approved the loot. :) 

Then today Mark and I were out shopping...

...and then he said something that opened Pandora's Box.

"You know...your kids are like INSANE readers that read everything in sight. They will tear through those chapter books you got in a few weeks. I know you're just dying to get more of that Geronimo series to finish your collection. We should just go to BAM and get the rest of the ones you need"

HOW DOES HE KNOW ME SO WELL?

I have been plotting all week how and when I was going to finish that series.

"OKAY!" I said.

16 books later...I have a stack of books which comes to my knee and this long post to show for it. 

BUT in my defense today was all Mark's FAULT. Blame him. I sure am. :) 

Awards I don't deserve

I am a terrible blogger. These past few weeks I have had NO time to comment on other people's blogs, comment on the comments I receive and post every day. I'm feeling like a blog loser.


I felt even worse when I read through my comments and realized several people had given me awards this week. :( I am so grateful. How sweet to think of this terrible, loser blogger. 


Natalie over at Teachery Tidbits gave me the One Lovely Blog Award. She is so fabulous! Please check out her blog. She teaches 1st grade and has AWESOME resources.

Julie over at 

 also gave me the One Lovely Blog Award. Julie, you rock! Julie teaches 3rd grade (same as me). Her bulletin boards are precious. Thanks again Julie!

and finally, Ashley and Erica from 

gave me the Liebster Award. Thanks guys! I'm so glad you did because then I discovered your adorable blog! I'm your newest follower!
Where's my award for "Worst Blogger Ever?" I really should have been given that.
I spent 7 hours yesterday editing and putting together my kids' "mixed up fairy tales" movies. Now I'm burning 18 copies which is taking FOREVER!! If only there were 45 hours in a day. Their excitement tomorrow will reassure me that it was all worth it. :)

WINNER!

Here is the winner of my first giveaway...

Congrats Erika! Please send me your email so I can send your gift card.

Giveaway ends tonight!

Remember my giveaway ends tonight when I fall asleep, which is 7:30. Just kidding, it's Friday so around 11. I'll announce the winner tomorrow. 

Click on the image to get more details.

I'm going to go take a nap and then head out to dinner with Mark. Long week = no cooking.

On "sort" of a roll and 100 FINALLY!!

Hi friends. Hope you enjoyed your weekend. I have been literally working on "school stuff" all day and I feel as though I don't have much to show for it. Do you ever feel like that? At times the responsibilities of a classroom teacher seem never ending. Oh wait, that's because they really are. :)


I put together two sorting activities this weekend for my kiddos. One is for sorting obtuse, acute, and right angles, because that's such an EASY concept for 3rd graders. <insert sarcasm > Angles are such an abstract concept and hard to master. For the most part my kids are "Angle Masters" but I wanted something that they could do this week to keep the skill fresh. We are 7 weeks away from FCAT! *GASPS* I'm doing everything possible to keep EVERY skill we have done this year current and remembered.  If only the school day lasted for 18 hours....then it would be no problem! 

The 2nd one is for transformations: flips (reflections), turns (rotations),

and slides (translations). 

Both of these products are in my Teacher's Notebook Shop

and will soon be in my TpT store as well. 

TN Shop

Check them out! 

Now for some earth shattering news... I have finally reached 100 followers. *MORE GASPS* Alright, Go Ms. V! Of course that means GIVEAWAY time!

I am giving away a $15 gift card to

I heart MyGrafico. They have great clip art collections and I can always find just what I need there. OK, here is what you can do to enter:

1. Follow my blog and comment that you do. If you already follow my blog, just leave me a comment saying so. (One entry)

2. Follow my TN Shop (one entry)

3. Follow my TpT Store (one entry)

4. Add my blog button to your blog (one entry)

5. Blog about the giveaway (two entries so leave two comments)

**Giveaway closes on Saturday night right before bed.**

That's it! Off to go work on more "school stuff" or maybe go pay attention to Mark. I'm starting to forget what the guy looks like. 

Sort it out!

To review symmetry I created a sorting activity for my students. This activity contains 84 different images which students can sort into two categories: symmetrical and non-symmetrical. There are also headers to sort the symmetrical images based on how many lines of symmetry they each have. This activity can be used for whole group instruction or as a center activity and it's now in both of my stores. :) Check it out!

TN Shop

TpT Store

New Inventory

Hello friends. Hope you had a great teaching day if you didn't get the day off. I spent the day running errands, having lunch with Mark at our favorite wing place, and doing spurts of nothing!


On Saturday Mark and I went down Ft. Myers. I have a credits and debits system in my classroom for behavior management. Students can earn credits for positive behavior and sadly, earn debits for behavior that is the opposite of positive. On Fridays when they are at Specials I write them checks for their credits. Then, they can take their checks to the bank and receive classroom cash. (I will do a LONG and DETAILED post about this whole system one day...just not today. lol) Every two weeks the class store is open. Students can buy various goodies and small trinkets with their class cash. Mark and I had a blast furnishing the store over the summer. I spent $200+ on the store but I wanted to ensure that it carried me at least to Christmas break. Fortunately it has brought me past Christmas break. Don't get me wrong, I still have a PLENTY in the store but you know how kids are...you have to keep them guessing and keep things fresh! So Mark and I set out on Saturday to replenish our inventory.


I don't know why we enjoy doing this but we do. It's fun to analyze children and how they think. We ask each other "Would you play with this if you were a kid?" "How much would a child pay for this?"  We spend hours in dollar stores, party stores, dollar sections, anywhere!! 

Here is our loot from Saturday's endeavors:

Please disregard the baby tub in the back. It's a gift for someone.

The noise putty (the jars in the back) sells out every time we put it in the store, so we keep raising the price. :) HAHA. It makes for a great economy lesson! Supply and demand. Apart from the noise putty and bouncy balls (what is it with kids and bouncy balls?), everything else are new items. Over the summer we talked about selling candy and how we felt about it. We wanted to stay away from it as much as possible. We do sell lollipops but the kids are over it. We are moving to Air Heads. We are getting desperate! LOL

I also made "Eat with the Teacher" Coupons, which aren't really coupons

because they cost $100. Students can purchase these as well. 

I'll have to take pictures of my class store. It's pretty cool. It covers my entire back table.

Work tomorrow....already? WOW, that was the fastest 3 day weekend ever. 

My New best friend

A package was delivered to our room today. A very important package. Our MimioView document camera. *gasps* We were so excited. 


I carefully opened the package as my kids watched in amazement. It was like Christmas morning. I took the camera out. Everyone gasped which was then followed by intense silence. Finally someone said "SOOOOOOO COOOOOL!" 

Here are some pictures:

Of course then the inevitable question arose, "Are you going to plug it in now and starting using it? Pleaseeeeeee!" (oh boy. I don't work well under pressure with 18 pairs of little eyes watching me, especially with technology) It was time for centers and the group that sits with me on Wednesdays promised that they would quietly read their reader's theater scripts, so I could switch out my old camera for the new one. I agreed and they were true to their promise. Installation for this precious gem was as easy as pie. I plugged the USB cord into my laptop and BOOM! Here are some pictures of the camera on my media cart. To avoid overusing my kiddo's expression of "SOOOOOOOO COOL," I will use my own. SUPERRRRRRRR COOOOOOOOOL. This camera is better than I anticipated. I am in love. Maybe more so than the love I feel for my classroom library. Hmmmm. I may have to think about that longer. 

I can use all the tools within Mimio Notebook while using the document camera. I can use the pen tool to write on sheets under the camera without actually writing on the sheet.

I am in love. <3

Here are some videos. Please don't mind my kids and I...

we sound ridiculous but we were so pumped! 

Let me leave you with this last thought...if you have any say or pull in what technology your district buys in the future, I ask that you consider DYMO Mimio products.

Their products are Kid Tested, Teacher Approved. :) 

Off to go lay down, I FEEL TERRIBLE (Sick again!) but I had to post about our fabulous addition to our class family. :) 

I HEART YOU PINTEREST

Pinterest...what was life like before this incredible gift? I'm totally addicted and if they had AA for Pinterest, I would nominate myself as the door holder for every meeting. 


I was feeling bold and "heartfelt" tonight, so I decided to do my Valentine's Day gift for my little darlings.

This is what I saw on Pinterest. I said to myself "Hey you can totally do this. It's so simple," and self said back "You got it kid. No problem." Well self was half right..half wrong.

I grabbed my crayons, knife, and cutting board and was ready to SLICE. Right after I put the camera down I had a "HELLO LADY!" moment. Uhhh, Tanya you have to take off the wrapping. OH. For some strange reason that step never crossed my mind. Its as if my prior knowledge on crayons strictly remembered seeing only "naked" crayons. So weird. After I got over my stupidity, I started peeling. WOW. Peeling wrapping off of crayons with nails = NOT A GOOD TIME. I still have crayon under my nails and this was a few hours ago. At first I tried doing it the dainty, girly way but after crayon #2 I was tearing into that thing like a lion who hadn't eaten in 7 days. (Of course this simile is not to be confused with me tearing into the crayon with my teeth but more WITH MY NAILS.)

After some time...no more than 40 minutes...this is what I had. 

I got the molds from Target. Target you are the glue that holds my life together.

There were so many questions during this endeavor....

"Should I cut the crayons into smaller pieces?"

"Should I cut the crayons into bigger pieces?"

"What colors would work the best?"

"Will I ever get the crayon out from under my nails?"

"Why do crayons have a weird texture/feeling to them?"

"I should have tried a recipe from Pinterest instead of a craft on a school night!"

The last sentence wasn't a question, but more a statement I pondered quite a few times...

I popped my little hearts into the oven at 250 degrees for 15 minutes.

13 minutes in, my oven started to produce an INTERESTING smell. 

Highlight of the night: "EW. I'm not eating whatever you have in the oven." - Mark (he missed the whole chopping crayons up bit and had no idea what I was doing in the kitchen. Oh to be a man and oblivious to life.) 

This is what they looked like when I took them out of the oven. I let them cool completely and then the popping started! 

Finished product:

LOVE. LOVE. LOVE. So worth it!! I know my kiddos will love them, and thanks to this craft, I now have built-in crayons under my nails. Go me. 

Off to go work on the template which the heart will sit on and to snuggle with Penny. :)