Five for Friday

Hello Friends!
Well, we are winding down over here and next week is my LAST WEEK of school! Only 2 days left and I am officially on summer break!! Woohoo! If you are not there yet, I know that y'all are getting pretty close yourself.  It was Friday and so it's time to Link up with Doodlebugs for her Five for Friday Party. Again, I know it's Saturday... but remember...I'm fashionably late. :)



1. I did not go into my classroom this whole week! I job share and only work Mon-Wed so I was at a Thinking Maps training for those 3 days. It was seriously mentally exhausting but I LOVED it and can't wait to come back and help train my school site on it.

2. My daughter had herpangina. Yup.. that's sounds pretty disgusting, I know.. but it's really not as bad or gross as it sounds. It's like hand, foot, and mouth disease without the hand and foot. Poor girl had sores all in  her throat. She's feeling better now, which is a good thing since I thought we would have to cancel our Disneyland trip. Speaking of....

3. DISNEYLAND!!! Ok, we seriously live only 30 mins away but when someone says they can sign you and your entire family of 5 in for free... it's exciting!!! FREE is GOOD!! We took our RV down there and stayed Thursday-Saturday. We went to Disneyland on Friday from the time it opened to until our kids all passed out. It was awesome! :)

Caught a pic with Minnie!

This was Karis' first time going to Disneyland where she  was aware of what was going on. She went when she was only 1 yrs old last time. Our friend got her a "1st Visit" badge that my hubby is putting on her.

We saw SO many princesses. There were more pictures but I don't want to bore you with all of them. :)

YUP! That's how we like to bring them home... ALL TUCKERED OUT! Makes for a nice evening chatting with the hubby. :)

3. I signed up for Boot Camp. For those of you who don't know what that is, it's a crazy workout group that meets like at 5:30am! Am I dumb or what??!!! 530am during summer vacation??!! This class better do some sort of magic on my body.

4. I got my Remembering the School Year Memory Book on TPT. I am getting more products on there since I just started about 2 months ago. It's a learning curve and I'm catching on how to do these units better and faster. First one took me like at least 60 hours!!!  If you don't have a fun memory book or are just looking for something different from what you've done, I would love for you to take a look at what I have. Students draw, measure, write summaries (all in a FUN way), and reflect. I also wrote a poem for teachers to give their students.

End of the School Year Memory Book

5. I got to take a nice loooong MUCH needed nap today. My honey is the best and watched all the kids while I actually feel asleep in our RV. I was going to clean it out but instead sat down, then laid down, and the next thing I knew, it was almost 3 hours later!  I really needed a vacation after our little getaway to Disneyland. It's a lot of work there. Fun, but a lot of work. I was exhausted!

There you go friends! Hopefully your week was fun and relaxing!

Blessings,
Angela Linzay

Disneyland Tomorrow and Memory Book

So the end of the year is here!!! Woohooo!!! Today is my last day of thinking maps training and then 2 more days of being in the classroom. I finally see the light at the end of the tunnel....and it's not a train! Ha! My mind is seriously spinning from all the thinking maps. It's an amazing tool that kids can use to organize their thinking, which increases their learning and comprehension. It's some high level stuff that has a lot of "rigor" to it (that was the buzz word for the training) that ANY child at ANY grade level can do. I can't help but think of the TPT units that I want to make with these maps!

Sooooo... tomorrow our family is going to take a little mini getaway to Disneyland. Thanks to some friends, we have a FREE day there!! Woohoo!! We seriously just live 30 mins away from Dland but my hubby had this great idea to stay in our RV right across the street. They have a nice RV park with a pool and everything. So we are making a little vacay out of it! We will be leaving tomorrow after the boys get out of school, which means that they will miss Friday because they'll be having a wildly good time at Disneyland violently ill. Whatever illness they're going to have is PRETTY contagious... I mean it's bad... REAL bad. :) So bad that I don't think ANYONE should come over to check up on them. I would just feel awful if they caught what they  are going to have have. :) This is Karis' first "real" trip at Disneyland. She went when she was a baby then we let our passes go because it was just ridiculously priced. So now that she is a little older (2 yrs old),  she will get to enjoy all things princessy!  Well, off to make some really BIG bows for her Disneyland day. But before I go, let me show you what I just posted on TPT that my students will be working on this Monday.

It's our memory book. I LOVE this memory book because students get to reflect back on the year, write summaries about their favorite stories that we've read, draw pictures, get autographs from classmates, etc. I will be adding our class picture to the book as well as a picture of the student and me that will go on top of the poem that I wrote for them.  It's all included with directions in red. I love when my students get to work on these but my favorite activity that I added this year to the book is a "Then and Now" page.  This is where they get to see their growth in writing as well as their physical growth (we are measuring) in just one year. I will be posting pictures of these on Monday when my kiddos begin working on them. If you don't have a memory book and/or just looking for something different and fun for your students to do at the end of the year, then you've got to get this. I spoke to one of my first grade teachers today and she already started it with her class. She said that they LOVED it. Yay!!! It feels so good when you create a product where BOTH teachers and students enjoy. Take a look here:

Remembering the School Year Memory Book

I will be updating my file every year and sending out new cover sheets to purchasers. :)

You can pick one of these up and keep your kids busy while you clean/pack up your room. They will have fun while you'll be getting the room ready for SUUUUMMMMEEERRR!!!! :) Just a little excited....ya' think??!!

Off to make bows now. :)

Blessings friend,

Angela Linzay