fiver, freebies and a clipart roundup

A few weeks ago, I drew Cheeks and his Geet monster (handmade and given to me by my super sweet coworker at my baby shower!)...it must have been fate, because as I was thinking what to do with his lil mini, I got a Shutterfly coupon for a free magnet in my email! Bam! So, I promptly uploaded his mini and ordered a magnet...which he steals from the fridge and I find later on the floor...he loooves it!

For the last 2 years, I've done individual portraits for my students. They absolutely love them! I just use a thin Sharpie and draw in some hair, a smile, a nose, and other little details. Then I fill in with a colored pencil. Of course, I've learned my lesson with teacher gifts and wait until the *perfect* moment to give them out (i.e. I don't pass them out when the rest of them are being passed out and the candy gets all the attention). This is one of those gifts that takes some time, so I feel it deserves a special introduction and I make sure to share each one with the entire class (on our projector) so everyone gets to see everyone's portrait.  Anyway, I can't find the template I used to use, so I made a new one with my fancy frames (you can find these in my store) and drew up a quick head and shoulders template.  You could also give them to students to draw family members, friends or themselves!

And here's what they looked like (with the old template) all colored in.

Or if you're looking for printable Valentine cards--grab this FREEBIE as well!

And I made this valentine parent letter class list for Valentine's Day! Note: it is NOT editable--you'll need to write student names. 

what the heck is bear bread?

Something I made this weekend: a very Alaskan chalkboard. First, I scored some bear bread. If you have never heard of bear bread, it's a hard fungus that grows on trees. Here's a few fine bear bread specimen (in my creepy scientist voice) in their natural habitat for you to gander.

 While writing this post, I started to wonder why we call it "bear bread" in the first place. Google couldn't really tell me, so if you have a link with info, please post it in the comments! I may or may not have just looked at a whole lot of different recipes for beer bread while searching, but that's not the same, so.....anywho...Here's what it looks like in all of its nature naked-ness on a Dr.Pepper (diet!) case.

Whammy! Chalkboard spray paint. Glorious.

And here he is sittin pretty for his outdoor photo shoot (on my front porch). I plan on putting him in the classroom and writing little reminders to students on him. He's going to match perfectly with my decor (see it here).

christmas in the classroom

It's Friday!!!! 2 weeks off of school! I have absolutely no plans, but I hope I get to sleep in a few days over the next couple of weeks!

My class made cookies in a jar for our wonderful volunteers. I've done this for the last 5 years (after reading about it on Beth Newingham's website) and just uploaded this FREEBIE kit. It includes everything you need (well, not really!) to put together your own set of cookies in jars. If it's too late for you to do this, you can still download it for next year :)  Of course, do me the grand favor and leave me some TpT feedback love, will ya?

 I was sick all last week, which sort of delayed some things, including our Elf on the Shelf. But, on Monday, a little box arrived (complete with snow on top) from the North Pole. And would you believe it? I didn't have one naysayer!

After some jets were cooled, we got down to the business of naming our elf. Although I really enjoyed the nomination of "Death Ray,"the class went with plain 'ol "Sneaky."

Here is Sneaky and Matthew Cando doing Roll and Write (math fact fluency)...Sneaky wrote doodles and jibberish for his equations and "math stinks" for the date. What.A.Jerk.

Sneaky also had fun on the whiteboard messing with my magnetic mustaches.

And the "ladies man"...

4.  This week was filled with literacy and math centers and a few crafts sprinkled throughout. We made these cute Santa's!

5.  We had Donuts with Dads (I call it "Dudes" though) in my class and made these craftivities. I love how different they all turn out!