Valentine's Day Goodies

Valentine's Day is just around the corner!  Every year I look forward to creating a new valentine for my students.  Creating cute tags or personalized goodie bags was my way to channel my creativity and find a break from the demands of teaching. 

As you might know if you've joined me on my previous posts, I'm no longer teaching in the classroom but in the gym.  I didn't even want to entertain the idea of creating some 400 'ish Valentine's for all the students at school this year. Are you crazy? So I did the next best thing... I'm sharing some ideas with you to use with your students! 

Last year I created a Valentine's Day word search card and taped on one of those fun pens with ALL the colors.  What were  they called?Okay, just googled it... a shuttle pen?  Retractable pen.  You get the point.  I bought the pens on Amazon and used Washi tape to secure them on each Valentine.

Since I'm not in the classroom, I created a digital version to share with others in my TpT store.  There's two versions of this Valentine if you're interested, 2 per page or 4.   I wanted to have an interactive Valentine that DIDN'T include candy and this worked out perfectly! If you're interested, check out the resource here: 

Valentine's Day Word Search card

...and I'm not done yet!  I also created this fun gift tag that would work for a Valentine's Day goodie too!  I originally created this tag as a back-to-school goodie for my students.  Why not use them for Valentine's too?  Simply attach them to some type of 'mint' candy or gum (if you dare).  You can even ramp it up and put the candies into a bag and tie with a cute bow.  That always made my teacher heart happy.  Then, once I see how quickly the students tear off the tag to get to the candy it was over. Ugh.  Oh well, it was always the time and thought I put into creating these goodies for my students that was meaningful for me anyways.  I know there's kiddos out there that have kept the tags or enjoyed the moment and I hope they know how special they continue to be to me!   

If you think you'd like to create this Valentine goodie check the resource here: Valentine 'Mint' to be Tag  It'll be great to use for back-to-school as well! Kids don't remember things from September to February anyways, right?  

Thanks for taking the time to check it out or simply read my ramblings! 

Find your balance,

Shelby 

Fraction Flip book

Fraction flipbook!

I 💗 fractions! As a classroom teacher I loved teaching fractions.  Maybe it was the hands-on learning of folding the paper strips into equal parts (although they were RARELY equal) or coloring and labeling all the unit fractions.  I don't know?  It was a straight forward concept of equal shares and what kid doesn't get 'making it equal' between 2, 3 or 4 kids? Am I right? Especially if it's a chocolate bar we're sharing you'd better bet they'll make sure it's being shared equally! 

Anyways, as I'm recreating resources for my TpT store I just KNEW I had to redo my old favorite.  The Fraction Flip book!  Back before the days of flip books and fancy fonts, or at least before I knew how to create a flip book, I did the only thing I knew how to do.  Copy and paste! I printed all the labels, cut everything out, and created one flip book with my grade-level colleague to use as our 'master copy'.  

You can check out the OG Fraction flip book we created on this old post of mine:

Old School Flipbook

I used this same flip book for MANY years and had no interest in creating a new one until this year because I'd need to be able to share the resource digitally with others. Funny thing too, I'm no longer teaching in the classroom this year so I can't even use the resource with my own students. Ugh! I'm now teaching Health & Fitness and obviously won't need to teach fractions anytime soon.

After a lot of problem solving and figuring out how to create pages that would print back-to-back and up side down.  No really!  There were A LOT of papers recycled throughout this process to say the least.  All in all, I was able to create the new and improved Fraction flip book! I LOVE how it turned out.  I was so excited to have tackled 

Check it out here in my TpT store: Fraction Flipbook

As always, feel free to share feedback if you use this product or if there's something you'd change or like to see.  I'd love to see how you use it as well!  Tag me in your photos @find.your_balance on instagram! https://www.instagram.com/find.your_balance/ 

Find your balance,

Shelby

Hello again!

Hello!

Long time no see. Almost five years to be exact. 

In June I finished my 12th year of teaching in the classroom.

In September, I started year 13 with a BIG change!  I've FINALLY made the switch into the gym, teaching Health & Fitness.  [More on this new position to come!]

Wow, a lot has happened!  I can't believe it's been that long, but then again time seems to fly by so quickly anymore.  Instead of going back through a play-by-play of all the changes, I'm going to start fresh today.  I do love to reminisce through all the old posts and laugh at how far I've come.    

"You should never regret anything in life.  If it's good, it's wonderful.  If it's bad, it's experience."

With that being said I've finally taken the plunge to put all those 'things I've created' onto Teachers pay Teachers! If you dig back into my original posts of 2012 (yes 2012), ten years ago to my original posts where I would share all my teacherin' crafts and projects I created for my classroom, you'll see some of the same ideas revamped with modern fonts and color schemes!  Again, I enjoyed looking back and having a laugh at my original work compared to what I create now.  Too funny! 

So yes, I created a storefront on TpT and now spend my free time in between teaching and trying to have a life recreating the resources that I originally created for my classroom, and the new ones I'll begin to create, to share with others.  I'm SO excited and thankful to Tyler who gave me the encouragement and support to take on this new challenge!  I look forward to seeing how it grows. 

Check it out here: https://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Store/Find-Your-Balance

Check back for more posts about the products I've created and follow along as I start this new journey.  It's all about finding YOUR balance, and for me that's having an outlet to be creative and share what I love doing!  You can also follow along on my instagram account:  @find.your_balance 

https://www.instagram.com/find.your_balance/

I'd love to hear your feedback if you purchase any of my products or how they work in your classroom!  Let me know if there's anything you'd change or maybe something you need!  

"It takes a village... and coffee"

Find your balance,

Shelby

February and snow

Can't believe it's already February! It's also snowing non-stop!  Snow is one of the reasons I love living in the PNW.  I'd love some warm weather though!  Groundhog did see his shadow, so I hope these next six weeks go by quickly!
I started to get ahead of Valentine's this year and they turned out so cute! It's an old idea I saw on Pinterest.  I wanted to get them done ahead of time since the next couple weekends will be busy traveling to the Seattle area for our regionals and state competitions!

 

Found the cute mini bags of gummy bears at World Market and used old colored papered I had at home.  The tag was easy to create using a clip art picture of gummy bears and added the text. So simple.                                                                  

I'm also continuing with my bullet journaling.  Having to track everything continues to keep me more accountable.  With January coming to a close it gave me a chance to reflect and make changes.  I also redesigned my weekly layout pages. I like how they turned out! 

This was my January doodles/quotes page.  I didn't really know how often I would use these pages but I love finding new quotes and being motivated by them!  I look forward to filling February's!

Alright. Schoolwork is finished for the morning.  Onto cleaning around the house and laundry before I brave the snow storm and get some shopping done.  A 'grandma' baby shower at school, goodie-bags for the girls, finish finding supplies for Ty's Valentine gift, and some book bingo game night gifts for school.  Oh and the usual grocery shopping. 

Loads to do. Better get going!

additional chalkboard design

I knew it was only a matter of time before I redid my recent design.  It turned out cute, and more importantly it was finished.  Here's to a year of getting things done.  And I did.  But then I didn't like how much extra space there was on the top so I continued to look for some quotes that would fill the space more and found this; A mind stretched by new experiences can never go back to it's old dimensions. travel. learn. grow.

I'll continue to make changes but here's how it currently looks.

 

quick chalkboard project

Last weekend I found this cute mini chalkboard easel at World Market.  I wanted to use it to write quotes on in the kitchen.  It's going to be an on going work-in-progress, so this morning I used a white colored pencil to add the quote "and I think to myself what a wonderful world".  Now that I'm done, I realize that I should have started a little higher on the chalkboard but I'm not going to fix it!  I know right?!  This year is all about getting things done.  Usually I would have fixed it so many times trying to get it perfect that it would probably still be sitting there unfinished.  No more!  I'll fix it when it's time to add a new quote.  

It sits on one of the kitchen counters for now and the picture below is my planning beforehand. 












 

Reading

Just finished the book A Man Called Ove by Fredrick Backman yesterday and excited to be starting this new one, All Fall Down by Jennifer Weiner.  Backman was a new author for me.  I previously finished reading My Grandmother Asked Me to Tell You She's Sorry that I'd found at Target.  They were different from my usual selections but I wasn't disappointed!  I'm looking forward to starting the soon to be released Britt-Marie Was Here but until then I pulled out an old book I'd bought but never started.  I've read many Weiner books before so I'm sure I won't be disappointed!

Start and FINISH reading more books this year. Check. Or at least off to a good start! 

On a side note, it turned out to be a snow day today due to all our overnight snowfall which is what prompted this post.  I woke up as usual, ready for work, but ended up having some extra quiet time to read. Bonus!