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End of Year Teacher Gifts

June 15, 2013 By JulieK

You know how much I love to make things :) the end of the school year is no exception!! It is no secret that I LOVE the school that the kids go to… And, I LOVE, LOVE, LOVE the teachers there!! So, every year, at least at Christmas and the end of the year, I try to let them know how much I appreciate them with a little something that I make…

Last Year’s Kids’ Gifts

2011 Teacher Gifts

Well, this year I made Mug Rugs!! What’s a mug rug you ask? It’s also called a snack mat, and here’s the little tags that I made to accompany the mats so that the teachers know what they are too :) I found an explanation on Pinterest to explain what mug rugs are, made tags using MS Word, cut them out and attached them to some pretty paper (Fancy Pants) and added a piece of ribbon to close the bags.

Here’s the stack of mats before I bagged them and got them ready to be gifts. The fabrics are from the School Days line by American Jane for Moda fabrics… I love how they came out… Amazing how easy it is to make super cute little gifts with a charm pack and jelly roll! Here’s the stack of them… Front

and the back

I made one for each of the teachers that the kids have, including all the specialists (I’m a specialist teacher myself :) I know how hard they work too!)… Plus the main office staff and principal and asst. principal. 16 mats in all. Here’s a close up of one of them, they are all different…

and a close up of the back

The mats measure about 5″x10″ For the kids main teachers, I made a mat, but found these pretty stoneware teacups and saucers, put the mug rug, some fancy teas and a Starbucks gift card in the cups and packaged them up.

Here’s the single ones packed up

I’m pretty happy with how they came out, and hope that the teachers like them.

Happy Summer!!!

A Fun Birthday Surprise!

May 30, 2013 By JulieK

Well, if you know me, the biggest surprise would be that I’m posting about my birthday at the end of May, because my birthday is in the middle of April!! But we were away over vacation, and then it rained for like a month, and I couldn’t get good pictures… But, anyway… Here is a picture of one of my favorite birthday gifts…

Isn’t he just the cutest garden ornament you’ve ever seen??? He was a gift from my wonderful in-laws because they know I have a “thing” with owls… And, the biggest reason that I have a thing for owls is THIS little guy…

My new garden owl now lives about 5 feet away from the tree that “our” owl lives in… We’ve had an owl before… Here’s a post with last year’s owl… and then there was the first owl in 2008… Clearly this is a different owl :) but this one has been back a couple of times… he was here in the fall and through the winter we saw him almost every evening and morning… Then he went away for a month or so, and came back! We haven’t seen him for a couple weeks, but in the evenings we can hear him… And also, we can hear another owl calling back to him! Wouldn’t it be cool if we had a baby owl in our tree??? Yes! Yes, that would be very cool!! Here’s some more pictures ’cause I can’t help myself! (you can click on the pictures to make them bigger…) I have a brand new zoom lens on its way to me… so hopefully the owl will come back so I can get MORE even better pictures :)

Winking…

The “What are YOU looking at” look

and one more view from a little further away…

and…my little buddy sleeping… I think we bore him :)

Why, Hello Miss Alcott!

May 26, 2013 By JulieK

Here’s another installment of “Oh, the quirky places we go!!”

It started out with Kathryn and an assignment at school where each student was assigned to “be” a famous person from Massachusetts… Kathryn was assigned Louisa May Alcott. They worked on the report at school, and there was going to be a presentation where the students dressed up as their person, gave the audience clues, and you had to guess who they were. So, on a random weekend, we were driving to the Concord Armory for an antique show… And, don’t we drive past the Orchard House, the home of Louisa May Alcott!! So, of course, we went in and took a tour!! The tour was really great!! Honestly I was a little nervous when it started because our tour guide looked like she was 12 :) but she was terrific!!

Of course we took a couple pics of Kathryn at “her” house for the report!

And, then of course, we “had” to make her a costume!! I took one of her old school shirts, that was just a little too small to wear comfortably all day, but still kinda fit… Then we went to the store and bought a flat sheet in blue and some pink hem lace… Make a skirt, overlay, and then some ruffles and lace to the shirt, and…

Voila!! Meet Miss Louisa May Alcott!

(not bad, but I’m pretty sure that Miss Alcott didn’t have neon orange and yellow sneakers)

and here’s a shot of Miss Alcott with her teacher… How much do we LOVE Miss Kasey!!

The costume was REALLY easy to make, and so much fun!! You can do so much with a sheet, a pack of lace and a sewing machine :)

Oh, the Quirky Places we Go!

May 14, 2013 By JulieK

If you know us, you know that we’re “hop in the car and go someplace” people! We’re always going someplace, and it’s usually some quirky out of the ordinary place. In fact, I’m often posting some “Guess where the Kelley’s are today” pictures on facebook :)

A couple of places we’ve been to recently have been real hits!! We headed out one weekend to Clinton, MA (not that far) to go to the Russian Icon Museum. Honestly, it’s wonderful!! If you have any interest at all in religious artifacts, it’s THE place to go. The collection is huge, the set-up and the displays are beautifully done, there’s a recorded “tour” with added information, and a kids’ scavenger hunt to keep the kiddos entertained while you’re reading about the icons! It was a great visit, and we’ll probably go again we liked it so much! They have a traveling exhibit of Matryoshka dolls (the nesting dolls) coming this month, do we’ll have to plan another trip! Wait, who am I kidding?? We don’t plan :) we just go!

Of course, no trip down route 495 would be complete unless we stopped at the candy store!! Colonial Candies in Bolton :) you can see the building from the highway. It was a little bit awkward while we were there because the 2 girls at the registers were arguing about who was supposed to ring us up… like I said, awkward… But the candy was yummy!

Coming up soon will be a post about our visit to The Orchard House and Miss Kathryn’s report about Louisa May Alcott (plus some pics of the costume I made for her) :)

Meet the Author: Tom Angleberger

April 8, 2013 By JulieK

We (and by “we” I really mean Sean) was so excited when we got an email from the Andover Bookstore saying that Tom Angleberger was going to be at the bookstore last week!! Sean LOVES his books! He already had most of them, and this was a good opportunity to get the new one and also have Mr. Angleberger sign them!!

Sean love, love, loved the Origami Yoda book, and the ones that followed, so meeting the author was very exciting! Every day after school he would check and make sure that we were planning to go… Friday afternoon we picked up the kids and headed right over there… The kids’ school is practically right across the parking lot, so we were the first ones there!

Mr. Angleberger was great! He did a little presentation where he asked the kids questions and added to drawings about the books… Sean got one of the drawings because he knew the name of the character from the book (he’s read them all several times!).

He also passed out green paper to everyone and demonstrated how to make their own origami Yoda!! It was fun, and the kids all really liked it!! Mr. Angleberger was so personable and fun, and really good with the kids who were all ages! When the presentation was done, he signed books and the origami Yoda that the kids made for everyone :)