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Tuesday, December 31, 2013

Happy New Year !!!




Here's to a creative, happy, healthy year!!!
Enjoy some of my favorite sayings from my Pinterest board, Wise Words.  

how to get through the crazy days...






this is me !!!


'cuz really I DO know where it is in the mess!


so much meaning these days...




Ok, so I  really don't make this face but I do in my head...


because the new evaluation system feels we need to keep reminding them, over and over again... lol


all the time...  :)


if your yearly evaluation is based in part on this you get it...




and I don't want to be either...

Happy new year all! Make it a good one!!!
Mrs. "C"  :) :) :)

:)













Monday, December 30, 2013

Getting Back to Routine...

It was dark and gloomy yesterday as it rained the entire day.

"Today is Monday? Isn't it?", my husband asked this morning... I actually had to think about it...

After listening to the weather report this morning and hearing that it was going to get seriously cold around here by this afternoon and snow Thursday/Friday I got up and started taking down all the Christmas decorations! The tree was undecorated and out the door in very little time... it was a pretty tree... it's now by the curb waiting to be picked up and recycled and repurposed into garden mulch... I took down all the Christmas lights that were wrapped around the front porch. Since it is going to snow I don't want them to get frozen to the railing indefinitely... we had lights and some christmas reindeer that got frozen into the ground/covered so deep in snow one year that it was the end of March before we could remove them!

I left a few things around the house to lessen the shock of losing all the decorations for my daughter... they can get packed away next weekend...

It's nice to have things back to semi-normal... now I have to sit down tomorrow and work on some things for school before we go back on Thursday... but then again if it snows enough maybe we won't be going back just yet... I wouldn't mind Thursday and Friday off...


My other cat, Sweetie Pie has been sitting at my feet all afternoon... well, it's back to doing laundry, then maybe I will finish the cowl I have been working on since yesterday... I'm liking how it looks but I'm not enjoying crocheting the pattern... it involves too much thinking and my brain just wants to be on auto-pilot at the moment... I love the flower brooch that goes with it!

Two more days and back to normalcy......     :)

Friday, December 27, 2013

After the Festivities...


" If I wait here long enough maybe she will toss me some more turkey..."  
( every time I walk into the kitchen my cat Mrs.P comes in and sits and waits for turkey since we were feeding her tid-bits on Christmas as a treat! ) 


This plate was filled with cannoli and Italian pastries...    


Someone gave my husband the most ENORMOUS box of Whtiman's Chocolates! The box is around 18"x24" !!!  It is going to take the rest of winter to eat them all!!!  There are so many treats, goodies and leftovers I can't even look at them! 



All the snow we got the other weekend is gone ( it was 60+ degrees on Sunday and the mountains of snow we had completely melted! )  We had a dusting on Christmas Eve that made everything look pretty and wintery for Christmas...  



Christmas was happy, relaxed and filled with food, family and Wii bowling!!!  (The Wii hasn't seen action in a long time )


My yarn stash has turned into a messy, colorful pile in the corner...  I have my mother's afghan to finish, some more cowls to make ( I'm on a cowl kick... they are light enough I don't sweat my brain's out at work and warm enough around my neck to keep me cozy...) I found some great patterns at Whisper Twister.  I have made several of her Dream Away Cowl.  At first the lacy pattern looked challenging but I can now crochet them with out even looking! I use Lion Brand Amazing yarn. it only takes 1 and a tiny bit of a second ball to make. 


My daughter and I are going to go see Catching Fire at the movies this afternoon. I can't wait to see what happens next! Movie theater popcorn and Slushies! 

In the back of my mind assessment ideas and lesson plan ideas keep trying to creep out but I just write down the thought and push it back down into my brain for later... 

Hope everyone had a wonderful Christmas and is relaxing! 

I just added a new link to my sidebar...  art2day  I read about it on The Art of Education this morning. It's awesome! Check it out!!!    :)

Mrs.C  :)




Friday, December 20, 2013

Merry Christmas and A Happy, Peaceful New Year...


Christmas break started today at exactly 1:30 p.m. ....  a much needed break for students and teacher's...  


                                  It's actually 12 days.....  aaahhhh.......  I will spend every moment relaxing, having fun and enjoying the company of family and friends...  oh yeah, and lots of crochet and sewing up my new school bag!!!




I hope everyone has a wonderful Christmas and a Happy, Peaceful New Year...  
                                              Mrs.C  :)

Friday, December 13, 2013

3d Grade - Pop Art Abstracts







It's been a while since I have posted some art work but we are seriously busy creating in the art room!  It has been so hectic at school that I would get home and realize that I forgot to take pictures ( again ).  I made a point today to stop, take pictures and edit them before I left school today! 

My 3d grades have been working on some way cool abstracts. Some of the things that I am working on this year as a teacher is getting my students to use higher order thinking skills.


When I created this poster for my art rooms this Fall I researched many visuals of Bloom's Taxonomy posters.  I took several and tweeked them to work for my room.  I created a design that I thought resembles a watercolor set.  I tried to choose words that would be age appropriate/art room usable so they made sense for my students.  

We began the lesson by spending one 30 minute class comparing and contrasting the art of Romero Britto and Piet Mondrian. 


I created 6 large posters that I placed at each one of our five art tables and one on my chalk board in the front of the room.


This sign is from a bulletin board outside my room with examples of the Ven diagrams the students filled out.  







After I explained what we were going to do,one of the first questions I got was," How is this art?"
I replied with, " Looking at and analyzing the art of both of these artists will help you to better understand how they created their art work and will help you to make creative decisions when you are designing your own abstract/Pop art piece next week."  I guess I answered the question well because there were no more questions/complaints about having to do the compare/contrast instead of drawing that class.  Let me just say the classes blew me away! ( seriously, why couldn't I have been observed during one of these classes? ) They worked together, listened to each other's ideas, helped one another spell words and come up with words to express what they were trying to say. I asked them to look, really look and dig deep while analyzing the art works. They worked in teams at their tables for about 10 minutes. I walked around the room
going table to table listening to what they had to say and throwing hints as to what to look for when they were struggling to find something. Once they got going though there was no stopping some of them! ( now I know I am painting this amazing picture of discussion and analyzing but there were those kids/classes that had to be prodded! ) 
When the 10 minutes were up as a class we all shared what we found and I wrote what they said on a giant Ven diagram I wrote on a large piece of paper. I originally used the SmartBoard for the first one and then I remembered why I hate to write draw on the thing! 


The next class we talked about some of those elements that the students found during the last class.  I gave them the choice of creating a piece that was completely Abstract created with just lines of different types or creating more of a Pop Art piece that included the image of a familiar object with the background broken up with line.  Either style had to include some patterned/designed sections but they could also have some solid color sections.


Most of the students chose to draw an image in the center of their piece.  The kids are working so very hard on these and are really proud of how they are turning out! We talked about taking pride in their art work and taking their time to color them in.  Next week will be the third class we will be working on these and the kids are hanging in there and are not rushing to finish.  A few have finished but a lot of the classes need the third class to finish up. The next three pictures are works in progress.  When the students are finished with their piece they will be doing a self-assessment of their piece.








Just a picture of what one of my students called " crazy art teacher legs " today.  I love the patterned leggings that are out in the stores lately. Alas, many are too teenage for me...  I found this pair last night at the mall while doing my Christmas shopping.  The black and white design was too cool to pass up and it came in XL. A rarity since an L these days are sized for toothpick people!  I paired them with a simple grey sweater dress and white infinity scarf.  Not too young looking, just fun! Plus they are really comfy!

Tomorrow I will be loading progress report grades into the computer early so I can get it over with. I want to bake some Christmas cookies since I didn't take a day off to make them this year. I usually take a Personal Day and spend the entire day baking like a mad woman! They are forecasting 8 inches of snow for us here tomorrow so I stopped and did my grocery shopping on my way home from work so I don't have to go out tomorrow. I don't plan on going any where tomorrow! 
Hope you all have a good weekend! One more week until Christmas Break and the natives are starting to get REALLY restless at school! ( that includes teachers too, not just the kiddos! )

Mrs. C  :)















Monday, December 9, 2013

Ice Day...


Today was a Snow day... or more accurately an Ice Day... an unexpected surprise..
We had a small amount of snow last night that turned into an ice storm over night. About a 1/4" of ice on everything this morning. Not too bad, but enough that they cancelled school after an initial delayed opening.



Spending the day relaxing ( now that I have salted and scraped the driveway ) a little decorating for Christmas...



a lazy, lazy day...

:)


Friday, December 6, 2013

Just Sayin'...



This morning in my school mail box I found this quote on a slip of paper with the words, Happy Friday typed onto it.  It was put there by a colleague as a  reminder that we (teachers) always strive to do our best even in impossible situations... so...
     







Happy Weekend
Mrs.C  :)

Sunday, December 1, 2013

Fabric Love...

 

I have a great passion for fabric and yarns... I spent a lot of time in my youth going to fabric stores with my mother to pick out patterns and fabric for clothing. My mother made a lot of the clothes we wore as children, I always had originals! People would always ask where I bought what I was wearing and I would proudly say that my mother made it! Sadly there are very few fabric stores in my area any more... I found this beauty at JoAnn's Fabrics this past Friday. While others were running around looking for Black Friday specials ( which mind you I think is pure lunacy... ) My mother, my daughter and I took my coupons for JoAnn's and went a shopping!( after lunch, there were really no crowds out at all! ) My daughter does not share my love for wandering through fabric and yarn but she did find a few goodies while we were there! I actually went to stock up on yarn for an afghan I am making my Mom for Christmas. I was wandering in the upholstery fabrics and came across this fabric and instantly fell in love! When I saw the price I literally choked! I bemoaned and groaned about buying it, not buying it...  my daughter told me that if I didn't buy some she was going to have to listen to me complain about not buying it, so... I sucked it up and bought a half of a yard...it was on sale and I used my teacher discount. It's just enough to make myself a new bag to cart all my stuff back and forth to school. It will be my Christmas break project! It's sitting folded by my sewing machine and I smile every time I look at it! My daughter thinks I'm nuts but those of you that love fabrics also know what I mean!  :)