Celebrating the Snow Day!

Hopefully, this will be the last snow day for a while here, because it's day three-in-a-row and I am missing my friends! Now that I've been hanging around the house for so long (thankfully, I was able to get out yesterday morning), I've finished laundry, dishes, taken out the trash, and I started and finished an entire book - all yesterday!

Today, I decided to post a couple of fun pics. The snow was almost up to my knees and it was actually a little higher in the back yard. (We had to stomp down a few paths for the puppies, or they would just be buried in snow!)

Me knee-deep in our front yard.

Our backyard winter wonderland.

I will say that the only one of us who's enjoying all of this indoor company and relaxation is Pete. :)

Happy Snow Days!

Teaching Journal

I'm thinking that my snow days are numbered, but I have probably spent the last couple of hours online checking out some fabulous teachers' websites!! I mean, these teachers are phenomenal!

They do some really creative and ah-mazing things! So much, that I've got a notebook full of notes that has pages and pages filled with awesome activities! (I'll modify them for music, of course.)

Which brings me to my problem... Where are all of the fabulous music teachers? I'm having the hardest time finding the incredible, wonderful, fantastic music teachers out there. Are there any in the blogging world? There have to be tons, but I would love some help finding them! If you are one or you know of one, please send the comments my way!

After reading Educating Esme for the billionth time, I decided to start my own Teaching Journal. This thing is filled with awesome ideas, pictures I've glued in (yes, the real ones and printed ones), things I love to do in my classroom, things I want to do in my classroom, bulletin board ideas, classroom theme ideas (tons of those out there), personal scriptures and quotes that motivate and support music and me, plus about anything else I can get my brain excited about! Highly recommend you start your own Teaching Journal if you haven't already!

Snow Day #3

Yes. It is stay-at-home-snow-day #3. Luckily, my hubby isn't able to drive to work either, so we've spent the day sleeping in, eating leftovers, playing with our sweet puppies, and getting some much need (and much deserved) rest and relaxation!

However, I came across this great song! OK, so it's our state song and I wish I could take credit for the lyrics, but I did see them on a friend's post and thought I'd pass them along! (Yes, I realize they left out a short part of the song...but you get the idea.) :)

SNOW-klahoma

Where the cold front's sweepin' down the plain

And the piles of sleet,

beneath your feet,

follow right behind the freezing rain!

We know we belong to the land

But it sure could use more salt and sand.

That's why we say - WHOA!

We're sliding the other way - YIKES!

We're only sayin' you're slick as snot, SNOW-klahoma!

SNOW-klahoma,

SNOW-K-L-A-H-O-M-A,

SNOW-klahoma, SNOW-K!

We got the phone call at noon today (pretty early for our district) that Snow Day #4 will occur tomorrow. I do plan to get a few educational/classroom things done here at home. At the very least, I'll get my lesson plans edited - since some of my classes will only have music once this week and last week. (How am I ever going to catch them up?!)

Just keep singing... Just keep singing...

Cello!

Quick story or two... I have some of the sweetest kindergartners this year. So sweet that when I ran into one today at Wally World, he crossed across the main isle, into oncoming cart traffic, nearly getting himself knocked over by some cart driver that must've been in a hurry (it's just days after a snowed-in city...people are everywhere and there's barely anything left that stocked, I get it). ANYWAY, my sweet student ran over to me in a hurry, grabbing a great big bear hug, and heading back to his father and sister. Apparently, they argued if it was really me or not since I have him this year, and had sister last year (with my blonde hair). She's off to middle school this year, but she was also a very sweet girl. Must run in the family, because they're both really awesome kids!

Yesterday, (more kindergartners, I'm seeing a pattern here) we were playing an instrument matching game for the last couple of minutes in our class time on our Smart Board (thanks be to nyphilkids.org!). My sweet gem saw her classmate turn over a string instrument and immediately turned to her neighbor, waved frantically, and sang "Cello!" as if she was greeting us all again! I do believe that it may have been the cutest thing I witnessed that day.

These are the sweet stories that get over-shadowed by un-ending amounts of paperwork, irritating colleagues, last-minute interruptions (4 times in a 25-minute class...I mean, seriously??!), and the dreaded stench of cat urine. Yes, my first class of the day was exposed to this smell and it did not leave my room until I left for my second school of the day...yuck.

Sounds like I'm exactly where I'm meant to be...

Spider Ball Mania

After two Snow Days... I feel like I was playing catch up with all of my classes! But I will say that my absolute favorite lesson this week was with Kindergarten - 2nd. We started by tossing around my "Spider Ball" (a medium-sized ball of yarn I threw together about 3 years ago...works for almost everything!). I would sing a student's name on so-mi pitches and they would sing back.

Musical Mimi: "Hello, Student."

Student: "Hello, Teacher."

I had each one echo back "Hello, Teacher" to me so I could grab a quick vocal assessment, but you know they thought the whole idea was to catch and throw the Spider Ball back to the teacher! They thought it was hysterical!

But our favorite song for this holiday seasons is the "Valentine Boogie!" We had us a pretty great time, and we're gonna boogie through the next week to get back on track! :)

Meet the Teacher!

Time for a party! I LOVE reading blogs…love it. All kinds of blogs. That’s A LOT of readin’! You can definitely start to feel like you “know” the people you’re reading about even though you’ve never met! Anyway, I’ve been obsessing over “teacher blogs” for a while now and would LOVE to get to know YOU better! So let’s have a “Meet the Teacher Party”!!!! First off, here’s a little bit about me…

Yep. That’s me. All 25 years of me. Been a blonde my whole life until about 8 months ago. I’ve been married for 2 1/2 years to a crazy wonderful man who puts up with all of my after-school-"prepping"-time.

LOVE.THEM. I’ve been teaching for 3 years {what?!}. The first year was serious chaos, but I taught music to all grades K-12 in a small school. Who knew that elementary would be my favorite?! (Actually, every music professor I had me pegged...elementary music for sure.) I’m the oldest of 3 and, seriously, I love my siblings like NO other. That's them up above.

I’d tell you a little about them, but that’s a WHOLE other post in itself. I graduated from the Oklahoma State University {GO POKES!!!!} with the hubby. I love Dr. Pepper, scentsy smells, collecting cookbooks, scrapbooking, spending time with my family, John Wayne, and I LOVE Jesus.

Now for the Q & A

Q: What would you be doing if you weren’t a teacher?
A: I would probably be working in a church as a music director or teach Sunday School. (Still a teaching job...does that count?)

Q: What are your hobbies?
A: Learning...yes, I'm a nerd and I'm proud! When there's time, I also love scrapbooking!

Q: When you were little, what did you want to be when you grew up?
A: I always played "teacher" when I was younger, but watching my parents teach in the system, once I was in high school -- there was no question! I was not havin' any of that! Got to college, and figured out that it must be what I'm here for.

Q: What are your guilty pleasures?
A: Queso! Give me a cup of queso and add some chips and salsa...I'm all yours! I'm also addicted to shopping and reality tv. (Both things I need to stop anytime now...)

Q: What is your biggest fear?!
A: This is EASY. Frogs, failing, and getting kidnapped. Pretty sure in that order. TER.RIF.IED.

Q: When you’re on vacation, where do you like to go?
A: Somewhere sunny! Jamaica for our honeymoon was a-mazing! The cold just doesn't do it for me.

Q: What’s the best advice you’ve ever received?
A: Be yourself….goofy and all; Pray about everything, worry about nothing; Don’t worry about what other people think about you…the ones that matter don't care, and the ones that care, don't matter.

Q: What do you value most in others?
A: Honesty….whether it’s being honest about something or being true to yourself! Kindness and loyalty are right up there, too!!

Q: If you could choose one of your personality traits to pass down to your kids, what would it be?
A: My sense of humor?! HA! I’m no comedian, but I sure can (and love to) laugh at myself and see the comedy in most situations :)

Q: If you could have lunch with anyone in the world….living or dead…who would it be?
A: Jesus and John Jacobson. And then I’d like to have a “teacher related” lunch with my bloggy friends Mrs. Mimi and more! :)

Now tell us one random thing about yourself:

I have two pugs - Wrigley and Pete. Wrigley we've raised since she was a puppy for almost 3 years not, and Pete's already 3 and we adopted him just over a year ago! They are like my kids, and their sweet faces get me everytime!

Wrigley

Now it’s time for YOU to join the party!!!! Here’s what you need to do: Write a post titled “Meet The Teacher”. Start with a brief “biography” and then copy & paste the Q&A {using your answers, of course!} Copy the web address of your “Meet the Teacher” post and come back here & link up! It would be GREAT if you could visit at least 3 other teachers…get to know a little bit about your fellow bloggers…and leave a comment!!!! Don't forget to grab a button when you link up!

Snow Day!!

Wow! Our weekend was soo beautiful! It was between 60-70 degrees outside - no exaggeration, but today we've been in a blizzard!! Most schools declared that school was closed last night... We were informed at 6:15 this morning (time to go back to bed? Yes, please!) and I was happy that we got our next call by 2:00 today. Yes, tomorrow will be closed as well, and no teacher is looking forward to making the days up (mostly, because we don't have a day in the schedule unless you count Spring Break...and no one wants to make up a day during that week).

Since the weathermen have been preparing us about this storm since about Saturday or Sunday, I was ready! I left school Monday with quite a few little tasks to tackle on my list! I've made the few things I can and finished the four projects for my sweet Kinders, and I'm loving the break! I'm thinking the only problem now may be the fact that I'm out of projects and I have an entire day to choose to rest or be productive tomorrow. How 'bout making it a day to be inspired? I'm thinking Freedom Writers, Ron Clark Story, Mad Hot Ballroom, etc. School-Themed Movie Marathon! (My hubby's really not going to be into this...) :)