celebrating

Last week my friend Karolina and I were recognized for being the certificated and classified staff of the year for our school. 

 The family came out to the board meeting to cheer me on. 

 Although, Donovan wasn't too impressed. He had more fun running up and down the halls playing "try to catch me."

 My Dad looked so handsome all dressed up. 

 After the meeting, we all went back to our house where we enjoyed the dessert of my choice, Grammie cake. My absolute favorite family recipe. 

There have been lots of things to celebrate in the classroom the last few weeks too. We are finally done with our state testing! And it's hard to believe but there are only 2 1/2 weeks left of the school year. 

I had to share a few pictures of some of the things that made me smile in our class last week. 

 My students bring the most random gifts for me all the time. Seriously, on a daily basis I get the weirdest but most well intentioned things. This one was especially crazy. It came in a birthday bag for starters and then I pulled out this creepy clown. My student told me it was for Donovan. Ha ha!

 Also, we've been working on our life cycle unit. Last week we planted marigold seeds in these little seed cups. One of my students misunderstood me when I said "marigolds" and he announced to the class... "YES! I LOVE MIRACLES!" My smarty pants student put him right in his place, "They're not miracles, they're mar-i-golds!" I love my little language learners. 

And last but not least, the most exciting thing happening in room 407, our butterflies hatched on Friday! Each student has their own and I must admit it was very hard to concentrate on any new learning as we were enthralled by watching them hatch one by one throughout the school day. 

I love this time of year. It's such a rewarding job in so many ways.