It's official!! My classroom is DONE!

I am SOOO excited to annouce that  after days and weeks of work, (Seriously started the end of July)my classroom is DONE! Just in time for a successful back to school night full of lots of families and third graders! (27 to be exact).  I am thrilled with how my room turned out and I hope that you enjoy looking at my new favorite place.

I have to say, I had lots of family and friends jump on board to help me with some of my projects.  My chair backs were painstakingly crafted by my mom and I on Friday afternoon.  My wonderful boyfriend created my writing center shelf that I love, and of course as I mentioned before, my colleague Brian, who helped me move and move file cabinets. My classroom vision would not have been as successful without their help!

Ok... now for the photos!!

We will start in the hallway! Our building used to be a middle school so we have lockers! 

They are great for storing backpack and other items! 

As you can see I am sporting the polka-dot theme! 

Just as you enter the room, custom made mailboxes and our classroom calendar. 

The two posters above will be the foundation for my classroom this year.  "We are teachers AND learners" and "None of us is as smart as ALL of us." (posters from Office Max!)

White board and wish list! 

Writing Center, notice the wonderful cabinet made by Phil Pickett!

Six Trait Posters and computer tables! 

iPad cart and rules! 

I hope you enjoy my photos.  I am so excited that my vision came true and am looking forward to year 8 in third grade!

Summer has come...and gone!

Wow!  The time has surely flown by this summer! My back to school panic started a little earlier than normal.  I was fortunate to have been chosen for a district iPad grant which will allow me to have a 2:1 ratio in my classroom next year!  However, new technology always comes with new ideas, new professional development, which in turn does not allow me to sleep, relax or do ANYTHING but school!  I guess that's when you know you are excited to begin a new year.

I also thought it would be a great idea to move into a bigger room this past May, so while developing Ipad lessons, I am also redoing, structuring and decorating my new classroom!  Needless to say, I have been in school mode for the past few weeks.  Hopefully, you haven't made that transistion quite yet, and are still enjoying time by the pool reading your romance novel.

I am looking forward to sharing some of my DIY projects with you that I plan to incorporate into my classroom for this upcoming school year.

File Cabinet Redo

I inherited these lovely file cabinets my first year of teaching (8 years ago!) stickers, dented drawers, ancient worksheets and all!

They have seen better days! 

 Instead of using my time wisely and actually cleaning out the drawers, I decided to change their appearance.I found this amazing file cabinet redo on First Grade Fairy Tales, that I couldn't resist! 

Materials: 

Gray spray paint (about two bottles per cabinet)
Purple contact paper from amazon (it cost about 20.00 but had PLENTY for all three cabinets).


Once you have gathered your supplies, spray paint your cabinets.

Being that file cabinets are not mobile, it was nice having another teacher, Mr. McDavitt, help me move them.  This went surprisingly well for me, considering my history of clumsiness and broken bones.  We only ended up spilling one cabinet over in the courtyard, oops!

We safely got this one to the courtyard! 

Before I spray painted these specific cabinets I had to get all the stickers off.  Hopefully the cabinets you have inherited do not have the same problem.  Any razor blade will do the trick.  I got most of the stickers off the cabinet and then got them spray painted.  Thankfully, no sanding was needed for this metal.

After the cabinets had dried, Brian and I moved them back inside and I began adhering the contact paper.  The size of each drawer was 11.5 x 13.5. I would suggest allowing a little extra to cover your entire drawer, the paper trims very easily.

Be sure before you adhere your contact paper to take off all of your handles and locks.  This again, was quite the task.  Fortunately, Mr. McDavitt was able to help get the handles off.  I came out with only a few scratches and bruises,  I say that's a win!

Once all of your handles have been removed, attach contact paper and smooth from the middle outwards.  This will allow you to get most of the bubbles out of your contact paper.  Attach your handles back to your drawers and viola,  a new set of beautiful file cabinets!!

Now if only I can get the motivation to clean them out.