It's time for the weekly link-up- Five for Friday with Doodle Bugs Teaching. Fire for Friday is a weekly linky party where you post 5 random things from the past week. Then you go back to Doodle Bugs and link up! Head on over to Doodle Bugs, Grab the Button, and get in on the fun! 

Greetings from New Orleans!!!! We are in town for the SDE Reading, Writing, Math and More conference. The conference has been AMAZING and we've learned a ton! Amanda Nickerson from One Extra Degree was fantastic! I can't wait to use her Interactive Notebook.  

Laureen Reynolds was HILARIOUS! I love seeing speakers that are comfortable, relaxed, and enjoy sarcasm. She has some amazing resources on Children's Lit on her blog. Especially her Information Text is not boring list. I can't wait to review these books and try them in the classroom. Check it out. You'll thank me. 

Katherine McKnight had teachers use Improv in the Classroom techniques and I've gotta tell you. I'm hooked. Talk about keeping your students engaged. She has videos up on herblog that show Improv being used. If you are looking for some new techniques give Improv a try. 

New Orleans is truly a beautiful city. We tried to explore but if you look at the sky in these pictures you can see that the weather was against us! You can even see the rain moving in behind us. It started pouring about a minute after that photo was taken. 

So while we waited for the rain to pass we went into the mall and enjoyed some Cafe Du Monde Beignets. HEAVEN I tell you. I could really go for some right now. I wish they delivered. 

We walked down to the French Quarter and were shocked to see 9 flavors of Daiquiris in slushy machines. We don't have these in Indiana! 

This may look like an innocent elevator in the Marriott but I am here to tell you otherwise! After getting soaked in the rain last night Michelle and I were so in a rush to get into the elevator and get back to the room to change into dry clothes. 

 I get in the elevator and turn around to see Michelle still standing in the hall. She points down to the floor and I look down to see a MASSIVE bug crawling around on the floor. 

I do not do creepy crawlies. 

I scream. The doors close. 

I can hear Michelle laughing on the other side of the door.  I hit the button to open the doors. Continue to dance around. And jump out the second the doors open. 

Needless to say we took a different elevator to the room. 

Don't judge me elevator security guy. Don't judge. 


This past week has been filled with laughs, amazing food, lots of great ideas, and good times all around. The weather didn't cooperate but we still had a blast. 

Stay tuned for Michelle's 5 for Friday! 

-Tracy 

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The Knit Wit Teacher

There are moments in your life that are eye opening.

This past week made it blatantly obvious that I am a HORRIBLE painter. I spent all of last Saturday in my room with my hubby and we painted the walls and my built in bookshelves. By the end of the day I was COVERED in paint. He had a few drops on him....That may or may not have been my fault.

Part of me thought I should wait until the very end to share my photos of my room update but the more I thought about it I realized that I wanted to share the process with you. The good and the bad. So here goes.

**Before you see these photos please remember that my room is a WRECK! I have boxes stacked everywhere. I have cleaning supplies spread throughout my room, books piled up, and desks crammed in the middle. This is the problem of moving rooms and redecorating at the same time. Everything is just thrown about. It's driving me cRaZy! ***

Ignore the mess :)

My walls before:
This was my front doorway:

 Front Wall:

Back Wall: I HATE that my projector is on my back wall. It just seems unnatural to be facing the wrong way. Take note of the ugly BROWN chalkboard.

 Cubby Wall:

 Window Wall:

Drum roll please........

After: 

Front Doorway: 

Front Wall: Take note of my new BLACK chalkboards and the bookshelves. The ugly brown had to go!

Back Wall: Just look at that pretty blackboard. I just love it.

FYI: When it came time to paint the front and back walls my hubby had to leave to go get the kids. This meant it was me, an edger, a roller, and the step ladder.

Saying I'm short is being kind. I am 5'3" in the right shoes. It was not fun trying to reach the top of the wall. Standing on my tiptoes painting around the screen was a not fun either. Don't look too closely at the ceiling tiles.

Cubbies: I just had to show them again.

I sat on top of the cubbies to paint them. I hope no one every looks at the top of these cubbies. It's not pretty up there.

I didn't think ahead before I climbed up there. I left the trash bags I was using as tarps and my rag on the floor. Once I got up I realized getting back down wasn't going to be fun. I'm not 20 anymore. At this point I weighed the pros and cons of climbing down or just saying forget it....I'm not proud to say that I took the mindset that no one would ever see it so I was just going to keep going.

But hey: The cubbies themselves are beautiful and that's all that matters!

Window Wall: Painting over the mural was a really difficult decision for me. I felt really bad about it but when I thought about it I realized that it just didn't fit me or the plan I have for the room. Painting the wall white really opened the room up and made it so much brighter. I still feel really guilty about painting over the mural but I know it was right for me.

 Take note of the ugly beige heater unit.

It was really gross. It took me about 30 minutes to scrape all the old tape off and to get rid of the dust. I could't stand for the ugly dirty beige to remain so I used Chalkboard paint to paint over it.

Now if you remember I dropped primer all over my floor......(Again: A painter I am not!)

This meant that I didn't have any primer left to cover the air unit. Hopefully this doesn't come back to bite me. The paint kept streaking when I was applying it..... but I finally got it to look smooth. Ignore the paint I dripped on the floor. If you think the floor is bad you should see my feet. I stepped in the paint. Oops. Luckily my carpet hasn't been cleaned yet. Whew!

My messiness aside I'm loving this chalkboard paint. It makes things pop.

See the corner where the white and green come together? It's really bugging me that I can't get a perfect straight line there. I need something to cover it up. Any ideas?


Have you seen Kinder-Craze's classroom? It's beautiful and I just love it.  Especially her file cabinets. They are bright and cheerful and they make me smile.

I NEED those file cabinets. It's spray paint. What could go wrong??? I can do this.

I watched her tutorial video, bought my supplies, gave myself a pep talk, and was ready to go.

EPIC FAIL! I'm still recovering from the horror of this process.

I had several things go wrong with this project:

I had 2 cans of spray paint. Needless to say that wasn't enough.

Wind was not my friend. Not my friend at all!

I streaked BADLY.

I ended up tinged yellow....

I admitted defeat.

I brought this bad boy home in hopes of being about to fix it tomorrow. Maybe. Covering it with contact paper may be my best option.

Throughout this process I've realized a few things:

Spray paint is not my friend.

Actually painting in general is not my friend. I'm bad at it. I'm messy. I get covered in paint from head to toe. I even get it on my elbows. Who does that? I'm a very messy painter and I TRY not to be. My klutziness doesn't help.

Getting paint out of your hair takes DAYS. Eventually I sat in front of my hubby and had him pick the paint out of my hair. I felt like a monkey.

My wall color matches my laptop cover. This wasn't intentional. I must really like this color. :)

I still have a TON of work to do to make this room mine/ours but it's coming together. It hasn't been perfect. I'm making mistakes. But I'm okay with that. I'm confident in my teaching abilities. Room decorating not so much. I'm treating it as a learning process.....I'm learning a lot.

Stay tuned. Next up:

Covering up my blue counter tops. Did you notice those on top of my air unit/bookshelves?  Deciding on if I'm getting rid of my ugly brown teacher desk for a pretty small white writing desk. Or one of the cute desks I found onEtsy.

And somehow fixing the yellow cabinet.

This should be fun!

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The Knit Wit Teacher

As I was blog hopping tonight I came across Oh' Boy 4th Grade and her June Currently post. I've never participated before and thought it would be a great way to see new blogs! Thanks for the link up! 

Listening:  Hubby and I are on a Castle kick. We try not to watch it when the kids are up so every night at 9:00 we start cramming in the next episode. I love the dialogue between Castle and Kate. If you haven't given Castle a try head over to Amazon prime and start watching. 

Loving: That I have 5 days till summer break!!!!! I can't tell you how excited this makes me. This has been the school year that wouldn't end. Snow day after snow day....I was beginning to wonder if I would ever see the end of school. 

Thinking: Lately all I can think about is moving to 4th. It's exciting and scary at the same time. Michelle and I have started working on mapping things out for next year. Working with your BFF is such a plus. 

Wanting: I had Orange Leaf for the first time a few months back. I'm hooked. The closest one to me is about 30 minutes away and with gas at $4.00 a gallon I can't justify driving that far just for frozen yogurt. I really wish they delivered. 

Needing: We moved into our new house 2 years ago. Last summer I was so busy moving schools that I didn't give the yard much thought. This year I've started planting perennials but I have a loooong way to go. I have a peony bush that I just planted that's not looking so great at the moment. I think I may have over watered it....any tips on how to help it back? 

Bucket List: I am moving classrooms for the 4th time! Hopefully this will be my last. I'd love to paint and make it my own but I can't decide what to do. I love Maria's classroom from Kinder-Craze. I love how open and airy everything looks. As of right now I'll have 29 students in the fall and I'm just now sure how to make my room open with that many desks. Thoughts? 

Michelle and I have started working on mapping out next year's curriculum. We are changing how we teach. While we think this is best it also means a lot of work on our part. We are revamping Reading, Writing, Math, Science and Social Studies. It's a huge project but oh so worth it.

Enjoy the last days of the school year friends! Take time to relax this summer and enjoy every minute. We deserve it! 

-Tracy 

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The Knit Wit Teacher