Five for Friday: April 12, 2013

Whew!

It’s been a minute!

I apologize for the “hiatus” – Between 3 Snow White performances, an emergency surgery for the hubs, and a much needed Spring Break I needed to do a little hibernating. 🙂

So…. my Five for Friday is more of a recap of what’s been going on since I was last in the blog-iverse.

1. Snow White and the 7 Dwarfs of the Black Forest

Yes, I know it’s probably supposed to be dwarves but that’s how it’s written on the script. So that’s how I have to type it out. Or is it one of those weird words?? 🙂  Isn’t that playbill fabulous? I wish I had taken pictures of the inside. My partner in crazy crime, Aileen at  iTeach, compiles our entire playbill each year. She is amazing. Equally amazing is Crystal at The Library Fox. We asked her to draw the cover image. We knew what we wanted, but we couldn’t seem to find the right pieces to put it together. I think you might have heard both of us squeal when we saw what Crystal drew for us. She takes lots of custom clip art requests and has a speedy turn-around, so make sure you check out her blog and her store!

We sold out all 3 shows, the kids were amazing, and Aileen and I are already talking about possibilities for next year!! I am still in awe that a group of 3rd, 4th, and 5th graders memorized a full two-act play in its entirety… and most of them don’t speak English as their first language. They are incredible!!!

2. Snor-a-saurus Rex No More… I Hope

The hubs had his tonsillectomy on March 25th. People, if I knew how hard the recovery was going to be on him I might have had second thoughts. Might. He was a miserable man. I still cannot believe he went back to work after just two days at home.

Now, we did have a “pothole” in his road to recovery last Wednesday, April 3rd. It was Opening Night for Snow White and B came early to help me run last minute errands – baby shampoo, 9-volt batteries, etc. What I didn’t know is that he had been spitting up blood all afternoon. (He didn’t want to worry me. I don’t know whether that’s sweet, crazy, or both!) He ended up leaving the performance early and not telling me. He was headed to the ER, but then the bleeding stopped. By the time it started again, I was on my way home. He was smart enough to call his surgeon’s office and got in touch with the on-call doctor who told us to get to the hospital. In our (almost) 4 years of marriage and 12 years of being together, this is the first time I have been truly frightened about losing my sweet boy. I am super thankful for a fantastic on-call surgeon who met us at the ER, my incredible in-laws who drove up and met me at the hospital just as he was being taken back for surgery, and an all-knowing God who carried us all through it. B had to have an artery cauterized and a golf ball sized clot removed from his throat. We were fortunate he did not have to have a blood transfusion because he had lost so much blood. They kept him overnight and we were home by 10:00 the next morning. My ever-fabulous partner wrote all of my sub plans and I was back for the play Thursday afternoon. My sweet boy went back to work on Monday and he is almost completely healed! God is good!

3. Cookin’ Again!

Now, with B being on the mend and the play taking up almost every minute of my life outside school for the past two weeks I haven’t been able to do much cooking. So when he asked for some “real food” and Spring Break arrived, I was more than happy to oblige.

I love using my Crock Pot. Even in the warmer weather. It keeps my kitchen cool, and I only really have to worry about sides (and wine!) sometimes. I am a big fan of Crockin’ Girls and B loves their Chicken and Dumplings so that is exactly what I made for his first “real” meal after surgery!

It was delicious! And so easy! When I make during the work week, I cut up everything I need the night before and set out my liquids and spices so I can dump and go. It takes about an extra 10-15 minutes, but it saves me at least an hour at night. Worth it!

Click for the recipe!

4. Antonyms and Synonyms

Before break, we were wrapping up our unit on synonyms and antonyms. That meant I had to go back and revise a LOT of products so that I wasn’t embarrassed to look at them anymore. 🙂

For example:

Click Me!

I am the most embarrassed about this one. Seriously. If you bought this, I owe you a big apology and a HUGE thank-you for not ripping me apart in the Feedback. 🙂 Please go re-download this. Ashley Hughes’ new Grab Your Glow Sticks papers are way too cute.

Click Me Too!

This used to be something called Synonym Antonym Rap. (Hangs head in shame.) Who was I kidding? I do not rap. At all. Total remodel. Again, there are 26 sweet friends out there who bought this and didn’t hate me before. I think you will love it now.

And one newbie!

Click Me Three!

We love to play Scoot in our room, so I had to make up some task cards for a quick assessment. I made more than enough – 12 synonym, 12 antonym and 12 mixed review – so I can go back and reassess my struggling sweet peas who were still confused before Spring Break. We’re going to be using a lot of the revised materials in the packs above, so be on the lookout for some fun posts from the classroom!

I also bundled all 4 of my synonym-antonym resources, so if you don’t have any of these you can save $3.25 if you buy the bundle!

One more makes FOUR!

 5. A FREEBIE!

If you have managed to read all the way through these ramblings, you deserve a freebie fo’ sho’! This is the song from my Synonyms and Antonyms pack. I found things I kind of liked on the internet, but I needed something a little more challenging for my kiddos so I created this.

Just click on the picture to grab it from Google Drive. Enjoy!

I hope you all have a fantastic weekend. I’ll see you SOON! I have something BIG and wonderful to share with you!