Kindness and other Winter randomness! (Plus a Kindness freebie!!)

Happy Sunday Peeps! Kerri here...
Actually, Happy GLORIOUS Sunday, since we have no school tomorrow! HOLLA!! 

I am about to get my Downton on (was last week's episode not TOTALLY SHOCKING and HORRIBLE?? I hated it.), and after that I just might get my SHERLOCK on too! Anyone else watch Sherlock? I just discovered it and OHEMGEE...I am in LOVE!

I keep forgetting to bring my camera to school, and then when I finally bring it, I forget to bring it back home! DURNIT! Please forgive the following photo dump...I have over a week of Wintery goodness (said with much *sarcasm*, since it has been over 80 degrees the entire week! Ugh...) to share with you, plus a new mini-unit on Kindness, AND a FREEBIE too!

We started the month of January with our snowman art and poetry writing...snow much fun!

We also wrote snowman stories...I love that this snowman lives in Mammoth, however I am NOT loving the printing here. Gotta work on that!

Isn't that baby snowman and ice cream cone so precious??

 We also worked on writing Wintery Super Sentences. More on that later! Stay tuned...

Of course, we had to have our Word of the Week literacy center on the word mittens...

And then, of course, we made Tacky the Penguin...my absolute FAVORITE of all time~

I am especially loving my Tacky the Penguin bulletin board right now...

So much Wintery fun, and not a drop of snow OR rain or EVEN chilliness to be had. Did I mention that it was 86 degrees this week? Here's proof...

So gross...

Moving right along...Our school is having a month long focus on Kindness for the month of January. Our theme is "Got Kindness? Pass It On!" and we are doing activities all month long to promote Kindness! It is pretty SWEET! 
Here is a look at the marquee outside my room...

We also made our front doors have a kindness theme this month. Doesn't my student teacher have some CRAZY MAD ARTISTIC skills? She cut those letters free hand. I kid you not. She is like a walking CAMEO machine!

In class, we have been working on reading books related to kindness and then filling out thinking maps about Kindness. We are turning all of these pages into a book and we will write stories about Kindness at the end of the month. So sweet!!

School wide, we also each made a Kindness Quilt after reading the book called, "The Kindness Quilt". I just love how ours turned out. We will be displaying all of them in the MPR the last week of January, which is our big Kindness Week!

We will also be taking the Great Kindness Challenge the last week of January, and our students will each be filling out a Kindness checklist, as they perform random acts of kindness.

If you are excited about teaching your kidlets how to be more kind, and spread Kindness to others in your school and community, I have created this little writing pack with all sorts of Kindness activities in it! Introducing...

Here's a little preview...

And here's what you get...

And here's a little Kindness FREEBIE for you to get your kidlets excited about Kindness! Click on picture to download from my TPT shop!!

Okay, friends! Bordelon out!! I gotta get on the Yoga mat and then it's Downton Time, baby!!
XOXO Kerri B

100 Days of Fun!!

Good Evening, Peeps! Kerri here...

Hope you all had a fantabulous first week back after break. My week went great, but DANGITALL, I was soooo tired! All those days of staying up late and waking up whenever I wanted caught up with me, I think!

I know some of you have your 100th day of school  coming up soon. Ours isn't until February 12th, but we have already started preparing. We order these AWESOME 100th day of school necklaces from ORiental Trading COmpany and they take a while to arrive, so we ordered them last Friday. I wanted to share some pictures from last years 100th day, in case you are looking for some fun things to do with your kidlets!
All of these activities are from my 100 Days of Fun Learning Activities Pack...

First up...100 year old students! I just love the bow tie and muu muu on these first 2 elderly folk...






 Grouchy old man and someone forgot to shave...for like 50 years!!
                       
                       

I just adore the hat on the first grandma up there, and those pearls are to DIE FOR, dahling!!

Here are some more fun things for the 100th day...

100 Days Trail Mix making

100-themed cupcake eating

100 Days Smarter Book prettifying...

Getting to have Zero the Hero AND his sister Zerona come out for a visit!

100 Days Smarter sentence unscrambling (Don't you love the grey hair??)

putting numbers 1-100 in order...

Buying a pony with 100 dollars

100 Days smarter crowns and necklaces too! (these are the Oriental Trading Company necklaces)

 Lots of 100 year old portraits!!

Writing 100 words...

Adding 2 dice and coloring our way to 100...

Writing about our lives when we're 100 years old...

Whew! I'm exhausted just remembering it all!! Can't wait until the 100th day this year! You can check out all of these activities in my 100 Days of Fun Pack!

XOXO Kerri B

Crafting and Creating/Fitness Linky 2014

Good Morning, Bits and Bobbers!! Kerri here...

Well, I had good intentions to blog about Crafting and Creating yesterday for Blog Hoppin's fun linky party going on, but then...well, vacation got in the way! Guess what movie we saw last night??

Oh man!! This movie was SO. AWESOME. Like, I want to get up today and go to Greenland, and then climb the Himalaya Mountains to meet Sean Penn (who is getting awfully wrinkly, BTW, but he still looks so ruggedly handsome!) 

LOVED LOVED LOVED it!!

So, here I am today playing catch up! 

Crafting and Creating...
Here are some of the crafty things I have made in the past and I'm pretty proud of... I'm the type of crafter that doesn't like detail work, it overwhelms me, so if I am going to be crafty, it has to be easy and not involve alot of detail. Hence, the polka dot theme using a round sponge brush gets used a lot in my projects. Easy to do and looks great every time!!

My beloved rocking chair!

My equally beloved polka dot box. I put all of my seasonal books in it each month to read to the kids!

Polka-dotted Fab Firsties...inspired by Babbling Abby's sign that she painted!

My crate seats covered in vinyl. Best thing I ever did was cover these bad boys in vinyl. My fabric got all yucky after the first year!

My first grade frame with adorable letters! I just love it!!

I also love to mod podge and I will mod podge just about anything...the dimensional mod podge is especially fun. I made these letter magnets using it...

Well, there you have it. Some of the fun craft things I have made over the past couple of years! :)

Onto fitness! 
Disclaimer...I HATE exercise and all things sports related. SERIOUSLY HATE IT. 
I hate to sweat, 
I hate being sweaty in the sun.
I hate running.
I hate watching or playing sports.
I hate talking about sports. 
My poor poor husband.

HOWEVER, I do love watching my daughter run in her high school cross country meets and watching my little one do gymnastics (maybe I'm living vicariously through them??).

Can you tell how much I hate sports and fitness?? In high school, I took one year of P.E. and then the next year, I begged the water polo/swimming coach to let me be his STATS girl, which got me into 6th period P.E., and he pretty much let me do NOTHING P.E. related for the rest of the year.  It was GLORIOUS PEOPLE!!

Don't get me wrong, I DO like to be active. I like to go on walks with my doggy, I like to bike ride with the fam and go on hikes in the mountains, as long as it is a balmy 72 degrees outside and I am not sweating. Sweating makes me grouchy.

But 2 summers ago, I discovered yoga. YOGA is awesome, Peeps!! Not that hot sweaty yoga (gag!), but the kind of yoga I can do in our playroom with the lights off and 2 fans blowing on my at all times! Fans are a must. It helps with the sweating.

I just completed the Ultimate Yogi in 108 days with Travis Eliot...

Here he is...Yes, okay, I just might have a little crush on him! No worries, my husband's good with it...

Here are the Ultimate Yogis in action...

Ahhhh....Balance. MY LEAST Favorite DVD. SOOO HARD!

So, I finally got to do 108 Sun Salutations on Day 108 (which was actually like day 150 for me. I just couldn't do it every single day. But hey, at least I finished, right?? and P.S. My hamstrings were KILLING me for DAYS afterward-ouch!) and I posted a pic on Instagram.

Guess who commented?? YES!!! The real Travis Eliot! OHMAGERD!!! Geeking out...

He said I was ultimate! Blush...

I am so much stronger (I have pretty rad arm muscles now and even a little muscle in my thighs-SHOCKER!!), more flexible, I have more stamina, and most of all-I actually set a fitness goal and accomplished it!! YAY ME!

I plan on doing another round of 108 this summer when I have all the time in the world (Ah summer, how I love thee....)!

Here are some the amazon links if you are interested in checking it out (especially if you are super un-atheltic like me and want a program that ANY BODY TYPE and any person can do)...

                                                           
Also, if you are looking into easing into yoga without committing to the full 108 days, his cross train video is AMAZING and encompasses all the different types of yoga into one dvd...

                                                                   

and if you have never done yoga EVER and are looking to start, he has another DVD called Yoga Foundations...


                                                                     

Well, that's all I got on the crafting/creating and fitness front. I'm off to enjoy my last weekday of vacation! We get to go to the Ducks hockey game tonight!1 Hope I get to see a fight! :)

Enjoy your Friday, Peeps!
XOXO Kerri B

2014 New Years Linky!!

Happy New Year, Bloggy friends!! Kerri here...

I hope you all had a wonderful and safe New Years Eve last night. We had a big old friends and family party here last night, and I am STILL in recovery mode today, it was THAT epic! Well, as epic as a bunch of 30-40 year olds chatting the night away and lots of children running around the house can get. I know, I know, we're pretty hard core around here!!

I'm linking up with my girls over at Blog Hoppin' for our latest 5 day linky party!!

Today, we're talking all about Friends and Family. How appropriate since I have spent every waking minute with my hubby and my girls over break (HELP ME PLEASE!) 

Just joking...I love every minute I spend with them...even time spent with the teenager that hibernates in her room and only comes out for food or money to get food. :)

The first day of our vacay was my hubby and my 15th year anniversary! We got rid of the kiddos, and went to the Spectrum to see the Hobbit (naturally!!) and to dinner at the Cheesecake Factory (yumminess!). 

The Mr. and I are POLAR opposites in every way possible (we even look so different from each other, I mean, could he make me look ANY paler??), but I just love this man to pieces!!

Next up in the friends and family category...Christmas! We got to see ALL of our family on Christmas, which was super busy but such a blessing! Christmas Eve brought the annual Christmas PJ gift to the girls...

And lots of fun with our family, including spending time with Brent's sister and the girl's favoritest auntie ever...

Next up for Friends and family, we went to see FROZEN yesterday and, OHMYWORD, I think I may be obsessed with this little movie. Holy Macaroni...it is AMAZING!
Here is a little video of my favorite song in the movie, sung by Edina Menzel (who I ADORE!!)...




Finally....New Years Eve Party at the Bordelons!! 
HOLLA!! 
We have an annual shin dig at our house every year, and it is always so much fun! Here is my favorite photo from last night-the moment when the ball dropped and the kids yelled Happy New Year!

disclaimer...these children are NOT drinking champagne. :)

This is how my husband his dad spent the ENTIRE night, watching football (those slackers!!)...

And one more of all the Bordelon girls, including my mom-in-law and sis-in-law (notice my teenager looking with love and adoration at her little sister-NOT!)...

Well, that was a whole bunch of family togetherness!! And tomorrow, I get to spend time with Miss Lindsay and her little guys so we can work on our So. Cal Kinder and First Grade Teacher Convention presentation (pardon me while I go throw up from nervousness...)

I'll be back tomorrow to talk crafting and creating!! LOVE IT!
XOXO Kerri B