Five For Friday & I'm Still Alive...Again!

Oh man oh man.  I know I wrote that blog post entitled "I'm Still Alive" about 2 months ago, letting everyone know I'm still here and blogging...hmm.  I guess that didn't work out to well.  This time, I am really trying to get back on the blogging scene though.  I swear!  Christmastime just became very busy, even for me, Miss I-Only-Sub-Now. :-) 

I'm feeling a little overwhelmed with where to start with this blog post, because a lot has happened in the past 2 months since I last wrote, so I thought I'd link up with Doodle Bugs Teaching for her Five For Friday linky (Sam hates that word...linky). This way it's okay to be totally random.  Plus I've secretly always wanted to join this link-up!

 

Last week, our family celebrated Sam's 29th birthday.  I can't believe he's 29!  God, he's SO OLD!  (I'm only saying that because I turned the same age 16 days before him).  To celebrate, we went to one of my favorite restaurants, Agave, with a large group of friends and his co-workers for some Mexican.  We had such a fabulous time!  I also made him Funfetti cupcakes, of course, because those are our fave!  This time, I tried something a bit new...

As you can see, they were stuffed with Oreos, and there was really no science behind it.  Just plop them right on top of some batter, and cover them over with more! MMMmmm!

Here is the birthday boy, himself! :-)

Saturday morning we received an unexpected snowstorm!  We ended up with about 7 inches. Poor Dudley has been so cooped up lately due to cold weather & icy conditions, so we decided to take a walk during the storm.  We went right over to Dudley's favorite place, large fields owned by a private school, where he could run around to his little heart's content. We were SOAKED by the time we arrived home.

I came down with the flu on Monday, which doesn't make for a very interesting week to share with you.  It was AWFUL, but really only for 1 day.  My fever climbed throughout the day and topped off over 103.  Sleeping wasn't fun at all, but luckily the next couple days I was only feeling a little off.  Definitely a far cry from my 10 day fever with mono last year, and for that I am THANKFUL!  Even so, just being trapped in the house for the past few days has already made me develop a case of the winter blues. 

I did get a chance to book a few more hotel...okay, motels, for our cross-country road trip that is coming up very soon!  Yup, we have a START date for our trip to San Diego...finally!  After we received the start date, I was able to start to break down our road trip day by day, and then start the motel reservation process.  Right now I only have one more to book for the way out there. We still aren't sure where we will be living once we arrive, but it could possibly be in La Jolla.  More exciting news on this subject- Mom is coming to visit us in March, and G & L, our family/friends, will be house-sitting and STAYING at our house while we are gone!  Hoooray!

www.roadtripusa.com

We'll be taking # 6 to Atlanta and then heading to San Diego via #10.  Can't wait!

I recently uploaded a couple new products to TpT.  One has a Valentine's Day theme, which I will share later, and the other is very chilly...

The Blustery Blizzard focuses on nouns, verbs, and adjectives, but since many find grammar to be a bit dull, it is very HANDS-ON.  There's only so many grammar worksheets and workbook pages a child can take!

Partner up your kiddos and provide them each their own mat and set of WINTERY-themed word cards! Next, your students will take turns rolling a 6-sided die and use the key on the activity's instructions to understand the meaning of each number they roll. Some numbers will prompt them to choose a word card with a certain part of speech (NOUN, VERB, or ADJECTIVE), which they must place on the correct section of their sorting mat. Other numbers will prompt students to remove a word card from their mat or skip a turn. If they roll a 5, WILD, they're able to choose any word card to add to their sorting mat!  The object of the game is to be the first student to have all of his/her cards sorted correctly.

 I would love for you to take a look at my grammar activity at my TpT store here, and I hope some of you will find it useful in your classroom!

Well friends, that just about finishes up my "Five For Friday"! Cheers to the weekend!

XO <3, C