My "Pete the Cat" Pre-K Class

This year I am teaching a community based special education class. It's about half and half kids with IEPs and typical peers. There are 2 teachers, Jen and me, and 2 aides. So far, I am loving it!!

We debated on a theme: ocean, jungle, dinosaur? We could not decide and after leaving Lakeshore with jungle themed decor, we still were not excited about it. While browsing Pinterest, Jen started seeing a lot of really cute "Pete the Cat" boards made. I only found 1 website I could buy "Pete the Cat" classroom decor! I knew I would have to get crafty and make a few things.

Back in the day, my mom made all of her bulletin boards so I knew just the right person to go to!! We had borrowed her friends overhead projector (yes, those still exist!!) for our baby room, which I'll post later.

I printed off a cover of a "Pete the Cat" book and traced it on an overhead projector sheet with a black sharpie. I blew the image up on the wall to the size that I liked and traced the whole thing with pencil onto blue butcher paper.  From there, I took the colors that I needed for the eyes, guitar, shoes, etc and traced it (like my mom is doing in the picture). 

I cut out each thing I traced and glued it onto the blue butcher paper where I had originally traced the whole picture. It was quite time consuming and was hard to be excited about when it was all glued on. All you could see were floating images of yellow eyes, guitar,  and shoes. It had taken me over an hour and I just felt "ehh" about it. 

After everything was glued on, I cut around the whole picture. What a difference that made!! I could finally see the "Pete the Cat" that I had been working so hard on!! Something was still missing though.. My mom told me the trick is to trace everything in black once you are all done.

The next task was getting him laminated. I am very picky on my lamination.. If I worked this hard on it, I didn't want the thin, cheap lamination that half the time peels up (like my school uses). One of my aides (and really GOOD friends), Natalie, took it to to Lakeshore to laminate, but he was TOO WIDE!! He wouldn't fit. She took him to Office Max, still TOO WIDE!! She finally went to Kinkos and they had a wide enough machine to laminate him. We paid for it, but SO WORTH IT! 

He looks pretty stinkin' cute up in the classroom, especially next to the ADORABLE border we bought.

We needed more things up in our GIANT classroom! We didn't have our class rules up. We had found a "Pete the Cat" Whole Body Listening  on Pinterest (warning: when you click on the actual pin, it brings you to a website that isn't the picture of the pin). Jen had found a similar rules pin for a Mr Potato Head . We modified both of them into this. We made it a whole-group learning the rules activity and the kids got to stick the words to his body in the correct spot. After both our AM and PM got their turn, we put him on the wall where everyone could see it.

The last "Pete the Cat" board was made by my mom. I can't take credit for her famous stuffed heads!! I don't know how she makes them in like 10 minutes!! She cuts out the butcher paper, glues on eyes, nose, and whiskers, staples around and started stuffing tissue paper in it. We put up the matching blue butcher paper on our board, used our cute border we bought, made some legs, and stapled his head up to corner to make the board his body. Our kids never walk by this board so we don't put a lot on it, but it is super cute for all the kindergarteners to see on a daily basis.

She is seriously AMAZING at these!! She's made farm animals, monkeys, bees, mice, pretty much anything you want!! 

Birthdays

Once again, I'm WAAAAY late posting!

Ben's and my birthday are only 16 days apart.. My family believes in this AMAZING time of BIRTHDAY MONTHS..  you get the whole month as an excuse to eat whatever you want! He gets the month of August and the day following his birthday begins MY birthday month!

Ben turns... 31!!!

I put streamers outside our door and blew up 31 balloons. Our dogs were not impressed with the balloons.. Maybe they were telling me we're too old for streamers and balloons!!

I try to make his birthday as special as I can. This year he worked on his birthday,  so for 4 days before his birthday he got presents.  We had already decided on one big present for each of us this year, but I still wanted to make it special.

MONDAY: Monday morning when he got home, he had a DELICIOUS treat waiting for him.. He LOVES funfetti so I found funfetti gooey cake bars. They were good, but SUPER sweet!

TUESDAY: Not a very exciting present, but I put a cute little note inside a jar. (He got his BIG present this day too, but I'm not posting about it lol..)  Super easy to make. First, put an empty toilet paper roll in a mason jar. Fill around the toilet paper with their favorite candies (Ben loves M&Ms.. I mixed mini and mega together). I put the note (or you can put money) inside the toilet paper. Last, put the lid on and tie a cute ribbon around.  

WEDNESDAY: Since Ben loves golfing, I tried to arrange for him to go golfing and wrapped up a new box of golf balls. Sadly, he didn't end up golfing, but I guess it's the thought that counts. 

THURSDAY: Like I said earlier, Ben LOVES funfetti. He wanted to bring funfetti cupcakes to work the following day. I guess it's kind of a cheater present, but I bought a box of funfetti mix, frosting,  and sprinkles and wrapped them up like a present. He somehow got "busy" that night helping someone so I made the cupcakes. BTW.. I'm HORRIBLE at icing, didn't let them cool enough, and wasn't patient to leave the case open to finish cooling;  so when the guys went to eat them, the frosting was like melted and not pretty anymore!

My family celebrated his birthday the following week. I asked my dad to pick up his favorite bundt cake. Ben and I were stopping by for a quick dinner before I went to a class and he did his fantasy football draft with my dad.. he had no idea we were celebrating his birthday :) Isn't that one SEXY face!! But mmmm.. White Chocolate Raspberry Bundt Cake from Nothing Bundt Cakes!!

Finally, it was my birthday month! I know,  I was so nice and gave up a few days of September so we could celebrate his birthday with the family!

I turn... 27!!!

He's not very good at keeping secrets from me, especially when he's so excited. However, all I knew was we were going to dinner at Texas de Brazil and then to a show. I had no clue what show! I was excited and started getting ready. I finished my makeup and as I was blow drying my hair,  I realized it wasn't feeling right.. I FORGOT TO WASH THE CONDITIONER OUT!! I didn't want to redo my makeup so I bent my head into the shower and had Ben help hold me up (my balance has been off with the baby in my belly). I rinsed my hair off in the shower and started the hair process over again. Because of my mistake,  we didn't have time for Texas de Brazil :( We were both bummed and I felt TERRIBLE!  We went to CPK and enjoyed a quick meal still and were off to the mystery show! We pulled up to NY, NY and I figured it out.. Zumanity!  We both had never seen it. Let me tell you, I didn't realize I was such a prude lol! It was good, but very sexual and some things were just overboard! If you're looking for the "normal" Cirque du Soleil, it didn't have as much of the acrobatics, crazy WOW moments.. More comedy.. Very funny comedy!

We celebrated a few days early with my family so Ben could be there (his work schedule did not like our birthdays this year). During our weekly Sunday Family Dinner, I got to choose what  I wanted to eat. This brain of mine doesn't remember what we ate already!! But I made sure I saved room for the best part of birthdays.. CAKE!! This was such a delicious ice cream cake from Baskin Robbins.. You got to love using the excuse of "the baby wanted it". I had to get a side picture of my bump (which I thought was huge then.. boy was I wrong.. I keeps on growing). So cool that she gets to be in pictures with us and be in memories with us before she's even here!!

My actual birthday was a Tuesday, which I worked.  When I got to school that morning, the ladies I work with had made a special "Birthday Breakfast"! Jen made her FAMOUS monkey bread (seriously I have never had better monkey bread).

 The other Jen bought a delicious Chocolate with Chocolate Chip bundt cake. I am so BLESSED to be working with the people that I work with!!

The next day I had my glucose test.. I definitely limited by sugar and drank A LOT of water to wash out all the birthday yummies!! The glucose drink gave me the worst headache!! At my Bradley Methods class, I brought everyone birthday mini cupcakes and cookies. I was so sick, my instructor gave me an apple to eat instead. She also has this adorable plate that she served it on. I really want to find something like this for my kids!!

The craziest part of our birthdays this year was realizing it's the last birthday without kids.. I am so excited to celebrate with Zalyla for the next birthdays to come!!