Wednesday, August 31, 2011

First Day of School 2011

Today was the first day of school!
Backpacks and lunch boxes ready for the big day!
Two happy boys.

Quinn 4th grade, and Riley 8th grade.

My day was really good too! Check out my classroom blog, by clicking HERE.

Tuesday, August 30, 2011

Busy Busy Busy

I went back to work last Thursday, and it seems that everything is a big blur since then! Super busy.
School starts tomorrow, and my classroom is ready! I was at school until 5 tonight, planning, making sure all was ready for tomorrow.
My supplies are ready, and pretty, I might add!
I have purple toes! I wanted to show my new students just how much school spirit I have!
Over the weekend, I made a bracelet. I finally got to use my big, chunky, fancy clasp.

I took this picture with my phone, when we were at the zoo. Isn't she so cute????

School starts tomorrow! Quinn is super excited, looking forward to seeing his friends and meeting his teacher. Riley is not so excited. I'm hoping once he gets there tomorrow, and meets his teachers, he'll be excited.

Saturday, August 27, 2011

San Francisco Zoo

School starts on Wednesday, so the boys and Kevin and I headed to the San Francisco Zoo this morning, as a way to put an end on a great summer. The zoo has made a lot of improvements, and they are working on even more. It's really coming along nicely.
Two boys, happy to go to the zoo.
What lion? I don't see a lion.
The newest zookeepers.
Such a sleepy owl. She was sitting on the ground, behind a low fence, and she stood so still, I was able to really zoom in on her face.
The Grizzly Bears were quite animated. It was a few minutes before the doors opened to their bigger enclosure, and feeding time, and they could not wait to get in there. They were running back and forth, making noises and pacing. It was quite the scene when the door was opened and they ran in to search for fish in their water area, and then other various fruits/veggies scattered around the rest of their enclosure. Not too long ago, a homeless guy climbed INTO the enclosure with the bears. I did not climb in. I felt like I could be one with the bears, without going into their home. I'm funny that way though.
The boys did climb ON this Grizzly Bear. The Grizzly Bears (the real ones) are super impressive.
There are peacocks all over the zoo. This one just let us take pictures of her, she wasn't shy.
The boys and a baby elephant. How sweet.
We spent over an hour watching this Fishing Cat try to catch a fish. It was a big fish, a carp, and a smart fish too. In the end though, and after the zookeeper let some of the water in the tank drain out, he caught his prize. He splashed into the water and grabbed that fish right up! He took it out of the water and then proceeded to play with it. The poor fish would flap all around while the cat hid and pounced, hid and pounced. Finally he carried it off to eat it. It was worth the wait. Proof of the food chain.
This is a Mandrill. He was very cooperative too! Look at his face, isn't he cute? His butt is pretty cute too, all blue and yellow and red. Just sayin'. Click my link at the bottom of this post and see for yourselves.

This giraffe found the wall quite tasty. They literally may eat the zoo out of house and home.

If you would like to see the rest of my pictures (and there are some very impressive lions and of course all of the shots of the Fishing Cat getting his fish, and the Mandrill's bottom) you just need to click HERE.

Friday, August 26, 2011

Hi Ho, Hi Ho...

I went back to work yesterday, officially. I was in my classroom for a few hours on Wednesday, but yesterday, I HAD to be there. I am mostly ready to go. I just need to make final preparations in my classroom, do some planning, oh yeah, and have some students show up on Wednesday!
These are the supplies that I used to create my new classroom discipline chart.
I cut the paper, and used Mod Podge to glue it to my extra long clipboard. It was all kinds of curly and stuff, so I had to be really patient, and coat it lots of time, to get it all to lay flat.
The finished product. Green is where the kids want to stay. Green means they have had a peachy keen, swell day. As the day goes along, and I have to talk to any of them about any issues, they will move their clothespin down, a color at a time. Red is the final straw, deep doo-doo. I will use this and stickers and our class money system to reward good behavior.

Now that I have my ducks all in a row, I am ready to rock and roll!

I am trying something new this year, and have just created a blog for the happenings in my classroom, which I hope that my students and their parents will visit. The kids don't come until Wednesday, but I have already posted on it, and had some people test the comment moderation for me, thanks to Facebook! Click HERE to view it.

Sunday, August 21, 2011

Ooops! More Disney

Oooops! I wanted to post these pictures, and I didn't. I'm doing it now.
Walt and Mickey and the castle.
Chip stopped by for a visit, and a picture.
Pluto was so much fun! He spent a lot of time at our table, grabbing onto all of us, hugging us, and posing for pictures. I love this picture.

The Rest of Our Disneyland Trip All in One Post

We are back from our last trip of the summer. We all had a great time at Disneyland. We rode the updated Star Tours ride a ton! We were able to visit all of the possible planets, much to the delight of two small boys.
These Storm Troopers were walking through Tomorrowland, and Quinn ran right up to them and force-pushed them, and then promptly ran away. It was so funny.
We found Boba Fett!
We had dinner at Goofy's Kitchen, at the Disneyland Hotel. It's a buffet, and it was really yummy! Characters come around to all of the tables and sign autographs or pose for pictures. It was lots of fun. I had peanut butter and jelly pizza!
Trying to get the sword OUT of the stone. Unsuccessful.
I was trying to take pictures of the castle, when I spotted Kevin rushing up Main Street, toward me.
These boys make cute toys. They are much easier to get out of the box, then real toys are!
This morning. We tried our best to ride the Mark Twain before we headed home. They were having technical difficulties, so we couldn't. Bummer.
The Crossman men in the Hub.
We left Disneyland after 10 this morning, and decided to stop in Hollywood. We had lunch at the Hard Rock Cafe, and then walked down to Grauman's Chinese Theater, to look at handprints and footprints of famous people.
Home of the Oscars!

Lots of people crowded around Michael Jackson's star.

We had a great time, but everyone is happy to be home. This is the boys last week of summer. I have to be at school on Thursday. I'm not sure if I will go there before then. I want to savor the rest of my summer. Maybe on Wednesday for a little while. I'm really not in any hurry.

If you want to look at ALL of my Disneyland pictures (315 of them), click HERE.

Thursday, August 18, 2011

One Last Summer Vacation

Part of the reason we decided to buy Go-Go's tickets for the LA show, was because we knew we wanted to squeeze in a end-of-summer Disneyland trip. We are here until Sunday.
Today was a beautiful, hot, day! We got to Disneyland early, before 8 am. We were able to ride the new, updated Star Tours. It was pretty freaking awesome!! There's something like 54 different combinations of rides! After Star Tours, we rode Space Mountain for the first time without using a Fastpass! The wait was 10 minutes!!
We rode the Jungle Cruise (of course). It's one of our favorites.
This tiki guy is outside of the little fruit market, by Jungle Cruise.
Kevin ordered these awesome Adventureland t-shirts for us all. The tiki guy on the front of the shirt is holding a Dole Whip, which is why Kevin is holding a Dole Whip. If you've never had a Pineapple Dole Whip, then you need to get to a Disney park NOW-or Hawaii.
Riley loves the very back row of the Thunder Mountain Railroad ride.
Outside Big Thunder Mountain there's this fancy hidden Mickey (or not so hidden) cactus.
Sleeping Beauty's Castle. I jazzied the picture up with one of my phone apps. I think it was Camera Bag.
We walked all the way down to the Disneyland Hotel. They are doing a ton of reconstruction over there. This place, Trader Sam's, is brand new. We took the boys inside (it's very cool) and had fruity drinks. There's also a new restaurant and the pool has been redone to include Monorail water slides! I have pictures, and when I get them uploaded to Flickr, I'll post a link.
Quinn spied these puppets while we were walking around Downtown Disney. He could not stop talking about them. He decided to use Grandma money and his own money, to purchase one for himself. This is the before shot.

This is the after shot. The guy (behind the BIG puppet), let Quinn pick out which dog he wanted, and pick his shirt, and pick his bandana. Then he trimmed the hair on the dog's face, put the clothes on (he threw in pants for free!), then brushed the dog all out, and even added some hairspray! I think he felt a closeness to Quinn who had visited the puppets a number of times before the big purchase. Quinn is infatuated with "Billy." I mean REALLY REALLY infatuated. He just loves this thing. At dinner he was making "Billy" wave to the waiter.

We came back to the hotel early tonight, since we were out pretty late last night. My feet hurt and so does my head. I have Tylenoled up, and ready to do it all again tomorrow!

The Go-Go's at The Greek

We are in Anaheim! We drove down yesterday.
We checked into our hotel and the boys went in the hotel pool and hot tub for a little while, before we headed out.
We had tickets to see The Go-Go's at The Greek! They were playing San Francisco on Tuesday night, but the tickets were general admission, and we wanted to take the boys, and we needed assigned seats. We decided to get tickets for the LA show, and my friend Juliet, her sister and her cousin, were able to join us!

It was such an awesome show! The Go-Go's were tons of fun! It was great to hear them play their old hits.