A Peek into Our Home School Room

Want to see where some of our magic takes place? This is our school room...

I found the desks on Amazon, and think they're just about the cutest thing I've ever seen. Well, except for the boys that use them. :) The legs will extend up to make them into full-size desks in the future.

Here is a closer look at our art lines...

I made them using cute red drawer knobs and picture-hanging wire from Hobby Lobby. That's also where I found the little red wall baskets.

Work it, work boxes!

If you know what these are... chances are you're a home schooler!

Another little tadpole!

Do you remember when I made frog and tadpole costumes for my boys?

I'm pretty sure that my little tadpole was the first baby in google image search history to be dressed as a tadpole. Well, you should be glad to know that now there's been a second little tadpole baby! Lauren M. used my tutorial to make this tadpole costume for her daughter's first Halloween. What's sweet is they always called her daughter "tadpole," even before she was born, so this was a perfect fit!

She says she isn't an experienced sewer but was able to follow along just fine. I think it turned out great, don't you?

Thanks Lauren!

Ear Flap Hats for Warm Trick-or-Treaters!

Do you remember when I shared my pattern for ear flap hats?

There are many variations you can make to this pattern, and it's great for Halloween because you can add eyes or ears to it for a number of different costumes. 

One of my lovely readers, Chelsea K, used my ear flap hat pattern as part of her son's Halloween costumes for the last two years. Here's the hat used in the Pocoyo costume she made him...

And here's the hat as part of a dog costume she made him the next year...

They live in Maine so she was glad to find an easy pattern to keep her son warm while trick-or-treating!

Thanks for sharing Chelsea!

To see lots of other cute ways my readers have used this hat pattern, visit my original post!

Easiest DIY Shelves Ever

In the process of organizing our garage, I came across the easiest shelving option ever. I just stacked up some Sterilite crates from WalMart, zip tied them together through the holes, and VOILA! A cute little shelving unit!

Bind it Up, Baby!

You may have noticed that I'm a little bit of a do-it-yourselfer. Today I'm going to show you one of my favorite tools I use in some of my do-it-myselfing. Let me introduce my Pro-Click Binding Machine...

This slick little device allows me to do my own binding. We use it for notebooking, binding school papers at the end of the year, and making my own planner.  

What's unique about the Pro-Click is the spines they use. You can "zip" them open or closed, allowing you to add more papers to something even after you bind it.

How cool is that?! (It's great for me since I usually change my mind later and decide to add something extra!) I love it! 

What are some of your favorite teacher tools?

Related post: Never Ever Ever Bind Anything at Staples!

Our Plan for First Grade

I thought I'd share what we'll be studying this year because...

Language Arts: 

I ended up writing a program of my own with a lot of help from The Three R's by Ruth Beechick. We'll be doing much of what you can read on my Writing page.

For reading, we'll keep going at his pace with easy readers. We're also going to use the Victory Drill Book, for practicing phonics, spelling, and word-building. Just for fun, I'm getting DICEcapades Word Pirates for game days. I am a believer in practicing skills with games rather than flash cards. It's more fitting for young children and doesn't zap the life out of school.