Momma Love

A mother's love. 

Maybe this picture is exactly enough of a blog post. 

How to Throw a Tantrum

Step one: Find any reason at all to get mad. IE: a brand-new and soon to be freakishly annoying baby doll that is still in its box, thus making you angry.

Step two: Be sure you are in a public setting because no one cares if you throw a tantrum on your own. IE: Dollar General

Step three: Find the highest traffic area to lay yourself down so that your mother has to give you attention or it disrupts other shoppers' experience. IE: An aisle in front of all the other aisles.

Step four: Have a mom who cares that you are angry. IE: Not a mom who takes pictures while walking away.

Step five: Lay in spread eagle there absolutely silent and wait for something to happen.

Step six: When nothing does happen and your mom starts leaving you, get up and run whining to your mom before she leaves you in the store for the trolls to eat you.

Step seven: Listen to Mommy get lectured by Daddy because she gave you the doll even after you threw a fit. Bad mommy.

It's a Bird, It's a Plane! No!! It's ...

Mrs. Parsons' Superheroes!!

Let me take you on a tour of a superhero themed classroom. 

When you come in, you will notice our flashy table names hanging from the ceiling. I have four table groups named after famous locations: Asgard (Thor); Gotham City (Batman, duh!); New York City (Spider-Man and others); and Metropolis (Superman). The kids loved this detail!!

Cafe reading board has superhero signs! It was a free download from TPT. Comment for the link, I just don't have it on my phone. 

Our Daily planet (scheduling board). As you can see, I am all about printing signs. I don't have the patience to hand create fancy smanchy stuff. But give me a Word document and I am all over that!!

On our Daily planet we have  our behavior chart on the far left. From top to bottom the sections are: Superhero, gaining power, HERO (have everything ready and organized), losing power, and powerless. 

Everything else is pretty explanatory except that I have added our classroom jobs. We did make our jobs sound like Superheroes as much as possible. 

Now is my first class pet! I do two things with naming pets: video games or superheroes (guess which I picked) PLUS we go in backwards alphabetical order with each consecutive pet. Therefore, our fish had to be named .... Drum roll please .... Xavier!!! After the amazing Professor Charles Xavier. 

Is this just a perfect Xavier or what???

As we continue, we have our book boxes that I used calendar numbers to label. I will have to readjust number 10....

And another close up of our calendar. The characters on here did have to be purchased. They are also on my nametags, which I didn't post because of last names. 

Again, I am really good at printing and not creating! So please, if you think my walls are bare- we have many regulations  in my building and I do add throughout the year with content specific pieces. Also, comment if you want the seller on TPT for the amazing things or just search for them. 😎😎😎

Blessings to every teacher who reads!

Nightmares of a Teacher

Before this week, I never had teaching nightmares or even dreams. My grandma (retired teacher since the nineties) tells me all the time about how she still has nightmares and crazy dreams about students in the classroom. 

This is where I start getting pensive about my job without breaking FERPA so I have to stay completely vague. 

After only starting my third year of teaching, I have heard many heartbreaking stories. They are beginning to keep me up at night and I spend many of my prayers on the children who deserve love in every way. Children should not be neglected, abused, molested, or hungry. As a mother and a woman who has devoted her life to be surrounded by little people, I am weighed down by the sins of men and women who have made terrible choices. 

This week, I have slept on the couch because I have been so fitful in my sleep that I am worried about waking up my daughter who sleeps within arms reach in her bed. She is the child I was given to protect and her father and I will protect her for the rest of our lives. Not just until she moves out, gets married, and has her own child. Forever I will protect and love her like she deserves. 

I had to tell a mother this week, "Even when it seems impossible, I will help him. Every child deserves a village."

Teachers choose to be a piece of every village and sometimes it is unbearable but the children need us. 

Nickname War

It has been awhile since I have been apart of my blog. Mainly, I haven't had access or time to a computer that is easy to type on. I don't think I can be one of those people to blog on my phone, unless I knew people cared. Typing on a keyboard is much easier with the use of ten digits, instead of just two - if I'm lucky enough to not be shielding my iPhone from my 1-year-old.

As a child starts to mold their personalities, parents begin to decide how to mold their own parenting decisions to best fit their child - and their own sanity. One battle that my husband and I are fighting is the Nickname War.

My name, Kirsti, has absolutely no good nicknames that go with it. In school, one boy was actually smart enough to come up with one - Kirst. Clever. Right? Honestly, what pre-teen doesn't enjoy being nicknamed  a homophone to "cursed." My husband's name, Daniel, is well-known and often stays in the top fifty lists year after year for baby names. It comes with history: Daniel in the Lion's Den; Daniel Craig; Daniel Day Lewis, etc. I bet you can name different men with the name Daniel in your own life that go by its popular nicknames - Dan & Danny. I have called my husband many nicknames and the most appropriate ones to share online would be Bat-Dan, Pae-Pae, and DP.

While my husband never appreciates people taking it upon themselves to give him nicknames, I always feel loved when people give me one.

This leads us to our greatest debate - Faith's nickname. My daughter has come out on top of our crazy family with an outstanding personality. She is spunky, funny, energetic, stubborn, genius, and wild-eyed. When people ask me why I call her Fifi all the time, it's for those reasons. To me, Faith is solemn and quiet and that is not how I view my daughter. Fifi is the toddler who grabs onto her father's pajama pants and throws all her weight backwards until she falls on the floor and has totally pants-ed Daniel. It's awesome.

What is Daniel's view on Fifi's nickname? "She's not a dog." No, Daniel, she's not but she is very similar to the puppy who runs and destroys everything in its wake just to turn around with a huge grin  and sly eyes that lets you know she'll do it again as soon as you clean it all up.

Plus, Daniel definitely called her Fifi yesterday before he caught himself. I think this is what is called, "Parental Progress."

Easy DIY Scrapbook with Wedding Cards

My least favorite thing is throwing away beautiful greeting cards. I will keep them in bags or boxes that the presents came with and then after about 2 years, or when I finally need the bag to wrap a present (recycling!), then I finally throw them away. I just couldn't do that with our wedding cards, so I found a solution inspired by my lack of beautiful script,  lack of a printer (to print captions), and lack of funds (to buy a Shutterfly photobook).  Scrapbook my cards! 

Another thing I used was a coffee table book that I got from a bridesmaid that had beautiful wedding quotes in it but I would never read or display, so I cut up the pages in that, too.

MATERIALS:

Scrapbook (ours was a wedding present from my mom's talented cousin)

Spray adhesive

Menagerie of  wedding cards

Scissors

Wedding photos

Wedding quote book

I just have photos of the finished project, none of the making. I did this one day while our honeymoon baby was sleeping, so I was rushing and didn't think to take "during" shots.

The cards that had really intricate pictures, I cut into the pictures and used them almost as a frame for the photos. It was pretty tricky but turned out alright. 

I wish I had more handwritten notes to us in the cards but I must have lost those or not gotten any because when I was making this, I didn't find them.

The spray adhesive I used was just to reinforce the pictures or cards when they were placed on top of each other since the scrapbook pages were already sticky.

Hopefully you kept your wedding cards or plan to! I love reading the wedding quotes when looking at our pictures. It brings back the emotions of the day.

Blessings,

Kirsti 

Half a Year!

Holy buckets.

 My baby girl is halfway to her first birthday. She's kind of a big deal. To update those of our family who don't follow me on Facebook - or don't get to see Daniel's amazingly entertaining stay-at-home-dad posts - here's what Faith has been up to this month.

She has outgrown her activity gym

 She knows how to roll the ball back and forth

She is able to rest on her knees and just hang out 

We're working on holding a bottle for ourselves

She's stinking cute!

How cute is this baby? Very.

She's learning how to stack the rings (she's a rock-star at UN-stacking)

Regular pillow talks with Daddy

Regular giggle-fits from Daddy

Visiting Grandma at her work - wearing matching outfits!

This is how Daddy dresses her - dress on backwards & bloomers from a different dress

Her big girl car seat!

Exploring every nook and cranny she can find

What's missing:

A video of her crawling (At 5.5 months)
Her signing MILK as I mix her bottles - I DID IT! I TAUGHT MY BABY SIGN!! *happy dance*
Giving kisses with her open mouth
How perfectly she puts herself to sleep now - without a peep!
Her pulling herself to standing along furniture and then WALKING on her own alongside it



And so much more. I know this is a bragging blog-post but I'm so momma-proud!