Busy Busy Week

Summer has unofficially ended for me. Last week I attended a two day Administrator's Academy as part of my new role as Language Arts department chair. I was completely brain dead after the first day and loopy by the end of the second day! I did enjoy getting together with everyone and working through what we want our campus to work towards this year. I hope these kids are ready for it! They're gonna work!

On Friday, I went up to work in my classroom. Two of my sweet friends, who are now stay at home moms but used to teach with me, came up to help me get some work done. My friend, Laura, pretty much did all my boards under my direction. She's A-mazing!  She helped me last year while I was pregnant and again this year and I'm not even pregnant! The good news is I think my walls are done. The bad news is I still have to finish organizing my library(a beast of a job), room arrangement, cleaning/organizing my area, etc.

Laura and I went into my old department chair's room to look at what's going and staying. I had to take a moment or 10 when I opened the closet and saw all the stuff I had to now clean out of there and find a home for. Laura had to leave but luckily my other friend, Carissa, and her two boys were on their way!

I must say, her son got right to work helping clean out the closet, take stuff off the cart, and actually organize it on my desks.  It took us two trips to the closet and it was done. That was a huge lifesaver! I was done after that though and needed to leave the mess on the desks for when I go up on Monday. I do  have a plan for what I need to do with it all which is good since I didn't have a single plan when I opened that door!

After the closet was unloaded into my room

Today, unfortunately, was my last day working in my room. I'm by far not even close to being done. Everything that came out of the closet has been found a home (well except for some office supplies). I've begun the task of working on my classroom library. New labels and organizing to come! I feel like I've gotten stuff accomplished but it sure would make me feel better to be able to work in it this week. This will be the last summer I sign up for a three day training the week before staff development!

Anchor chart wall

Using Post Its to remind me the genre until the labels are finished

I'm exhausted. So that's going to have to be all for now!

It's a Sunday Smorgasbord!

Today I'm linking up with Michelle over at Fabulous in First for a little bit of this and a little bit of that. And that's exactly what's going to happen today!

I'm already a little bit scattered with ideas and I've been catching up on blogs, packing for this beach trip (packing the baby for the trip!), and thinking of things I want to do in my classroom next year. I don't think since I've been out of school my brain has stopped. Maybe this week while on vacation I can actually stop and enjoy the time with family and friends.

Bit #1: Tomorrow we leave from DFW and drive to New Orleans for the first leg of the trip. We'll spend the night in New Orleans and then continue to Pensacola, Florida the following day to {finally} get to spend some time on the white sandy beaches of Florida and in the emerald green water of the Gulf of Mexico. I know. Jealous right? If you have any ideas for what we should definitely not miss out on (with a 7 month old) let me know!

Bit #2: She has arrived! {Cue trumpeters} My Erin Condren planner is finally here. In my previous post I forgot to mention I also got a matching iPad case...yeah. It's beautiful. Gorgeous. Everything I wanted. I've already spent yesterday filling in the calendar and taking pictures to make all my friends envious. I already feel organized. I won't stay in that place, but it's nice to start there :) Here she is. This picture definitely doesn't do it justice.

Bit #3: I've seen a lot of people blogging about what they're going to be doing in their classroom next year. I'm going to be honest. I have no idea. I know that I want to keep my gold and black theme (our school colors). I know I want to redo the labels on my bins in my library. Anything beyond that and I'm clueless. I think one reason is because I'm starting a literary magazine at our school but not sure if I'm getting a class to get my staff from or if I'm going to have a club. That makes it hard in figuring out exactly what I'm doing. I also only know that I'm teaching 8th grade Language Arts. I'm not sure how many sections or what else is going to be added. And so I wait. I continue to gather ideas. I add them to my Pinterest boards. My mind might just explode!

I guess that's about it. I probably won't be blogging this week. We'll play catch up when I get back! Have a great week!