Hand Stitching and Another Lovely Award

I must be slightly nuts! I decided that I hated the ugly green curtains on a shelf I have at work so I should make new ones. Sounds simple right....well I also decided not to go for hot gluing (which is my tool of choice for fabric) and am hand stitching them... in the middle of the night....
Oh my lordy....and before you ask, well why aren't you using a sewing machine maybe I should give you some background about me and sewing machines. We don't click. I have had three different people attempt to teach me to use one and all I end up doing is wasting fabric and breaking the machine so when I sew, I sew by hand.

Since I think I am nuts for hand hemming curtains in the middle of the night I decided to take a break and give some over due thanks.

Being in the blogging world is definitely rewarding. I received a lovely blog award from two very lovely bloggers: Jackie at Crazy Daze in First Grade and Miss Pasqua at Miss Pasqua's Kinder. Thank you so very much for thinking of me for this award.

Here are the guidelines:
1. Follow the person who gave you the award
2. Link back to the person that gave you the award
3. Pass the award on to 15 people

Here are my awardees:

1. Kindergarten Korner

2. Carried Away in Kindergarten

3. Me and My Kindergarten Gang

4. 1...2...3.. Teach With Me
5. The Silver Lining
6. Miss Kindergarten
7. Peace, Love and First Grade
8. Chalk Talk
9. A Cupcake for the Teacher
10. Just Wild About Teaching
11. Life in First Grade
12. Kindergarten is a Hoot
13. Sharing Kindergarten

(I know I am supposed to pick fifteen but once I started writing this blog I got sidetracked for hours reading through all these and other blogs that I found through these. I think I may need a 12 step program after all!!!)

:)  :)

1

Another Award/ Newbie Blog Hop/ Cooking and...

Hello all of you out there in Blogland! I am losing my mind in thinking about all that I haven't done to prepare my classroom but I am again in my lazy summer place where I spent most of my weekend hanging out by the Venetian Pool in Coral Gables and cooking in my house.

The water was sooo cool (it comes from an aquifer) which was great on a hot Florida day!

In one of my many trips to the computer I found out I had received another award! (YAY!) The delightful Cindy Smith over at Kindergarten Loves gave me the Liebster Award!This award is named for the German word "Liebster," which translates to "beloved" or "favorite," and it is given to "new and upcoming bloggers."

Thank you tons for the award! If you have not visited her blog you really should!

So here are the rules:
1. Link back to the person who gave it to you. (Did that above ;)
2. Post the award to your blog. (Did that too :)
3. Give the award to at least 5 bloggers with less than 200 followers.
4. Leave a comment on the 5 blogs to let them know that they have been offered this award.  (Did that too!) 
Here are five bloggers that I believe also should receive this lovely award.

  

(I could only find four sites of the ones I love that fit the criteria. I guess that means I should spend more time looking through blogs!)

Now I am going to join the Newbie Blog Hop train. I hope I do this right but if I don't, oh well, I'll learn...

1. What state are you in?
I am in Florida.
2. What is your current teaching position?
I teach kindergarten at a difficult elementary school in Miami.
3. What is your teaching experience?
Well. I began by teaching 2nd grade my first three years. After that I took a very short break to be an Intervention Specialist (very long and convoluted story) I taught a 4th/ 5th grade combo for a special program named Highways to Success and dealt with some very special and at times scary children. They were overage for their grade and the program offered the possibility of skipping a grade. After the program got cancelled I was placed at the school where I am now in which I've taught second, then kinder, then first, and now I am back to kinder. I have changed classrooms A LOT!
4. When did you start blogging?
I officially started blogging November 2011, but have not had much time till this summer.
5. Share a blogging tip or resource.
Well for me linky parties are what have really made me excited about blogging. Being able to join in "conversations" that interest me and that I can contribute something to gives me a great feeling of commaraderie. I would say as you read through blogland and a linky party catches your eye definitely join in. I also think pinterest is a great resource for blogging because you can find new blogs through your interests. :) 

To top off all this sharing I spent my Sunday getting better acquainted with my slow cooker. I love to cook! But good cooking takes time, effort, and trips to the supermarket.... which I don't always have.

This weekend I did decide would be the day I pick a recipe and prepare it. The recipe for the weekend was Chicken and Dumpling Soup.

Mine looked a lot like the one in the picture with one big difference. I had never made dumplings before and well.......... my dumplings kinda disintegrated into the soup instead of cooking up. So I must try this another time with a different dumpling recipe.

I also quite proud of myself because I finished typing up the part of my classroom library list I had brought home on Friday. Now to go to sleep so that I can wake up nice a early and think of ways to sneak into my classroom again to continue trying to set up.

Classroom Library Set-up and An Award!

Well I finally received my cute primary colored baskets from Really Good Stuff so I went into my room hoping and praying the A/C was fixed (it was!) in order to work on my classroom library.

I love books but I have been horrible at organizing them, making finding them in the past three years or so quite difficult. I have tried organizing them by genre (not so great idea for me), by author (did not get through that), and by reading level (never enough of any particular level). My collection is also very eclectic, I have wordless books all the way up to Harry Potter. I have taught K, 1st, 2nd, 4th, and 5th so I have books for all these grades. I have also been through three schools, so I have lost books, given away books, and some have "walked" away (I have had many sticky handed students).

I have been looking through blogs and reading many people's ways to organize their libraries, as well as speaking to co-workers for their ideas. After thinking it over, I have decided to try it by author for the books I have for one author in particular and then by genre for general books. In order to keep all these books straight, I am also making up a database of my books so that I know what I have and where it is. So I spent two hours going through only 1 of my books bins (ignoring my chapter books that would not be taken out for my kinders) and I realized I have another large bin plus 7 smaller boxes of books!!! This may take me forever! (either that or I will have to start taking them home with me). Sigh... but I am determined.

On a happy note I was given a lovely blogging award!!! My first one!!! It was given to me by Brigid over at Brigid's Daily Lesson Log. Thank you very much! You are lovely to think of me. :) If you have not checked out her blog make sure you do!

Here is the award!!!

Okay and as I understand it I am supposed to give facts about me and nominate other awesome blogs!

Here are my nominated blogs:

1, 2, 3,...Teach With Me

Adventures of Ms. Smith

Apples and ABCs

Color Me Kinder

Heather's Heart

First Grade WOW

Kinder Kraziness

Ms. Kerri and her Krazy Kindergarten

Swertzy's Swap Job

Who's On First?

Kreative in Kinder

Lanier's Lions

Classroom Snapshots

For the Love of Kindergarten

Pocket Full of Kinders!

Random Facts: (I don't really know how many to put but I will add in until I am no longer random  :)

1. I have not decided if I should get an Master's or not. (I know I should though.)

2. I am an American citizen but I was not born here. I was born in the Dominican Republic and became a citizen of the U.S. when I was 17.

3. I love true crime shows: Deadly Women, Whow the Bleep Did I Marry?, and The Nightmare Next Door to name a few.

4. I am also obsessed with Toddlers in Tiaras! (Yes, I know. The moms and dads are nuts to do that to their babies but it is adorable and super funny).

5. I love Harry Potter still. I re-read the seventh book every couple of  months just to remind myself that the series is really over.

6. I did not really like Fifty Shades of Grey, then again I also did not like the Twilight series. (I don't find obsessive love realistic or even attractive, but if you liked it more power to you.)

7. I live in Florida, but I don't really like living here....

8. When I was younger I wanted to be a lawyer and then I went to a magnet school with a legal branch and then decided I would make a much better teacher than a lawyer. (In college, I did take a law class just to see if I could do it during my freshman year. I was good but I was bored.)

9. I have never fallen in love, but I really would like to someday.

10. I love teaching, but because I have been teaching primary for so long I don't know if I want to have kids of my own. (Don't get me wrong, I adore kids (way more than adults) but I don't know how to balance very well and I feel like I would either gip my own kids or my students.)

11. I can do a split. :)

12. I have 1 younger sister who works at a hotel in Times Square who I miss on a daily basis.

13. I have a very tough exterior at times but am way more sensitive to moods and experiences than people think I am.

14. I love the Autumn season and not just because my birthday is in October. I love the leaves changing color and the days getting slightly cooler. (Well not in Florida but in many other places.)

15. I am a Scorpio and I do believe that I fit all the traits both positive and negative of a Scorpio:

Well bye, bye for now. :)