Cyber Monday Great Amazon Deals for Gift Giving

I recently became an Amazon Associate since well, I LOVE to shop and why not earn a little extra for my habit LOL. Plus I decided to use the proceeds to benefit the children of District 6 in Zion! Here are some ideas to help you check off those gift-giving lists on this SNOWY SNOW DAY - Cyber Monday!!

First up COFFEE - you need a good, strong cupa' to get through this blizzardy day in northern Illinois AdairChef Grab N' Go Personal Coffee Maker

I was fortunate enough to be on the launch team for this book. If you have a mama, daughter, aunt, friend who is a mother this is a must-have gift this season. Even though I've been a mama for almost 30 years, within the first few pages I felt the tears coming. Rachel brings all the feels of being a Mom The Brave Art of Motherhood: Fight Fear, Gain Confidence, and Find Yourself Again

These blue-light glasses are becoming a must-have for me after dark on any of my devices ~ Kindle, iPad, laptop etc ... they really reduce the glare and the tired eyes syndrome GAMMA RAY 003 UV Glare Protection Amber Tinted Computer Readers Glasses Anti Harmful Blue Rays in Shatterproof Memory Flex Frame - +0.00 Magnification

Favorite Skincare products Hands Down ~ I buy when it's price/slashed Colleen Rothschild Beauty Radiant Cleansing Balm, 3.30 Ounce

Yummy PJ's for Christmas Eve Simple Joys by Carter's Boys' 3-Piece Snug-Fit Cotton Christmas Pajama Set, Red/White Stripe/Santa, 24M

And for the Techies you {{{heart}}} Bose SoundLink around-ear wireless headphones II Black

Add Alexa to ANY room All-new Echo Dot (3rd Gen) - Smart speaker with Alexa - Charcoal

My favorite hand-held vacuum cleaner ~ easy to carry around a multi-level home A SUPER deal!! Shark Rocket Corded Ultra-Light Hand Vacuum for Carpet with TruePet Mini Motorized Brush and 15-foot Power Cord (HV292), Maroon

Digital Picture Frames bring INSTANT smiles NIX Advance Digital Picture Frame, with HD Video, Hu Motion Sensor and USB/SD Card Playback - X10H

That's all for now! Gotta go grab some Lightning Flash Steals myself! “As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases.”

To Be or NOT To Be ... that is the question :)

So, I'm thinking of resurrecting this ole blog ... it is so sorely neglected .. and I'm wondering just how many of you would be interested in reading it

Here are some of the topics I've juggled around writing about ~
Bucket Lists of Things to do with Teen Kiddos
How I Single-Handledly followed Mrs. Wills Kindergarten for a year straight and duplicated each one of her weeks of lesson plans for my own Kinders
Spiritual Fitness
Fashion over 50

Comment and let me know what you think!!

Happy Summer!!

Tablescape Alert {Thanksgiving}

It's that time of year ~ my favorite holiday!! THANKSGIVING!!  I was styling a birthday party a couple weeks ago and was reminded of one of my favorite party stylists, Amanda Parker at Amanda's Parties To Go.  She has been my inspiration for several parties including this Ladies Bunco Get-Together:

And this Teen Birthday Party:

This Mother's Day Beauty:

A Magical Middle School Birthday:

A Superbowl Extravaganza:

And our Family Thanksgiving 3 years ago:

Check out this Kid Table that she designed:

So, what to do this year?  I, of course, went to the Mother of all Inspiration ~ Pinterest, and found these Thanksgiving tablescapes:

Do I keep it simple?

Or go Vintage White?

How about we take it outside?

Or keep it more traditional?

What would you like to see this year?  You can weigh in below!

A Project for a Snowy Day or for an HOUR before your guests are arriving for the Super Bowl ...

I recently got some PINspiration from Cassie over at Hi Sugarplum.  If you've never gone to her site, YOU MUST, right now!!!

She is the brilliance behind projects such as these and her house is beautifully decorated "on a budget" :)

AND her fashion sense is just my style

AND just look at the way her outfits are inspired ~

Anyway, on to the reason for this post, I was inspired by Cassie's Pantry Party, a complete overhaul of her pantry!  You can see her before & after's here.

SO, one snowy weekend right before the Super Bowl I headed to IKEA.  I was able to get all of the storage bins, etc there and had previously found the stackable shelf piece at Bed Bath & Beyond.  Let me just say that Cassie was absolutely right on when she said that this project was done for UNDER $100!

Here are my before's:

 Haha ~ GIANT size Cocoa Pebbles, we're real health nuts around here ;) 

And the problem was, I never knew what was lurking back behind everything else and so I would end up with 9 jillion cups of applesauce ...

Here's what it looked like DURING...

And, drum roll please ...

sorry for the poor picture quality, had to take these with my phone, my camera was at school that weekend. . .

Now I can hide the unhealthy cereals that I eat ~ nom nom nom

And the labels, just some cute scrapbook paper and a fun font on my computer!

Cassie, you're right, I just keep going over and opening the door and gazing lovingly for long moments of time ...  BLISS!

EVERYONE around here has been fairly warned, not a thing put away in the wrong bin or you might get your fingers cut off!  This thing is a piece of ART!  And I think I've convinced "The Accountant" that the money spent will keep us from over-spending in the future ;) ;)

What do you think?  Need some more organizing inspiration?  Head on over to Hi Sugarplum!

Saving Sergeant Ryan

It was one year ago, on a cold and snowy day, that my Kinders finally got to meet Sergeant Ryan Lehman.  After serving in Afghanistan for a year he was FINALLY home!  Sergeant Lehman's mom and I had been friends for a long time; in fact I knew Sergeant Lehman when he was a very little boy.  Early in the school year, I thought of a way to teach my kiddos how to love and care for someone whom they had never met!    So we began learning about Sergeant Ryan and seeing pictures of his day to day life in Arghanistan.  One day his mom brought in pictures of the soldiers giving the Afghan children pens and how much joy it gave them to receive such a little, inexpensive item.  Another day she brought in some MRE's (Meals Ready to Eat) and we had a tasting test.  We learned that Sergeant Ryan's favorite was the Beef-a-roni.  In fact we had a little Science lesson about how the soldiers "warmed up" their packets of food.

Then one day we decided to take up a little collection. The Kinders brought in all kinds of colored pens and little "gumball machine" type toys and we sent a package all the way to Afghanistan.  We heard in a letter from Sergeant Ryan that the Afghan children had loved their surprises.

We thought of Sergeant Ryan weekly and his mom would come in to our classroom and give us little updates about how he was doing.  And then we heard that he was coming home!!!

Over Christmas Break I came in and decorated our hallway.  It had to be a hero's welcome!  We were FINALLY going to meet Sergeant Lehman!

The morning he came in we could hardly contain our excitement and then THERE HE WAS!

I can hardly put into words the lessons that were learned by all of us!  I saw children with very little material possessions of their own GIVE out of their own hearts.  I saw them learn to show love and care to someone who they had never met.  I saw them feel compassion for children from another country who they saw as worse off than themselves! And I learned once again that paying it forward is one of the best ways to experience joy in your own heart!

Countdown to Christmas for the Classroom

Sorry this is a little late but I really still wanted to share an activity that I incorporated during December that quickly became the MOST anticipated event of each day!  I'm talking about our Classroom Countdown to Christmas.  Awhile back, I was reading a post at Teaching Heart (correct me if I'm wrong Colleen but I'm pretty sure I got the idea from you :).  Anyway, she shared how each Christmas she would wrap up the holiday books and each night her kids would get to open one up for their before bedtime reading.  Well, this got my brain cells cooking and I thought of a way to incorporate a fun advent countdown into my classroom but still keep it "common core happy".  So, one night after everyone left to go home, I brought a decorated tree into my classroom, put some twinkly lights on it, plugged it in and wrapped 26 (that's how many kinders I have) holiday books.  The next morning you would have thought Santa came but I made them wait till after lunch to know what it was all about.

The next thing I did was put each of the little darlings names on a cute gift tag and hide them all in a Christmas tin!  At read aloud time I would open the tin up, shake it around (add to the suspense) and pull a name.  Think of a "naughty and nice list" here!  I had TOTAL control over whose name was getting pulled that day [wink, wink]!!

Whomever's name (is that correct grammar, or is whomever's even a word??) was pulled got to pick a present, unwrap it, sit by me and turn the pages as I read the book!!! WOW was I teacher of the year (in my kiddos eyes) or what?!!

It was a pretty easy peasy lemon squeezy idea to pull off and brought great delight!

I MADE IT ~ 100 FOLLOWERS :)

THANKS to everyone who followed!!  I made my goal of 100 followers before Christmas break was over! Now, as promised I have a beautiful Organizer Tote by 31 to give away!!

I have two of these and I just love them!  They are big enough to hold everything but the kitchen sink and if you're like me that's just about what I lug back and forth to school each day.  You can check out even more of their wonderful bags at my consultant, Chris McGurn's website here!

Spread the word and Get Ready, Get Set, GO!!


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Thanks again everyone!  Looking forward to what lies ahead!