Thinking Thoughts on Thursday...

As I sit here surrounded by maps and guidebooks and train schedules along with flight information, I am realizing how quickly time is passing. We are headed to Philadelphia, New Jersey & New York in September and are very excited but also very exhausted with planning. There is so much we want to do, that there is no way we can squeeze it all in to 1 week. So of course my mind begins to wander and I am all over the place, because of this, today's post will be all over the place with a few topics that are here and there.

Don't have the time or funds for a vacation? How about a staycation?! Head to a local hotel or museum in your town/city and in the lobby they tend to have free brochures all about your area. Put together a fun itinerary for the weekend, exploring new places and if you have extra funds or plan ahead, stay in a local hotel with a pool, to add on the fun of it all! Can't do that? Make a day of fun experiences and then head home and have everyone bunk together in one room for the night watching movies and chatting or a living room sleepover with some fun, family activities!

 

Thrifty Thursday craft tip is to make an angel out of an old hardcover book, these are a dime a dozen at bag sales and so easy to do! Once you've folded down a triangle of EACH page, just use a hot glue gun to bunch ribbon and glue to the left and right side where the book covers are exposed, these become the angels wings. Do the same at the bottom, so that it defines her dress. Add a styro-ball head and yarn or something similar for hair. Making a triangle pouch up front is perfect for holding a rosary or gift card.

I have a large notebook that I keep with me when I read, along with post-its and pens and highlighters. I like to jot down notes and or quotes that speak to me as I go along and in the case of books where authors feel the need to toss in 100 different characters, then I need to keep track of them somehow. As I read I use the post-it notes to mark areas of the book that I want to look at again or what I think is a pivotal part of the story. Am I the only nerd that reads like this?

Break free & enjoy every minute my friends!

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Monday Morning Musings...

The weather in northern IL is chilly, it calls for a fire to be burning constantly, because I like to keep the thermostat at 65*. Yikes! I know, I know that's chilly but it saves us money and we all get to snuggle under warm blankets whenever we sit down! What do you keep your temp at if you are in a cold zone?

Remember earlier in the month I mentioned my goal of drinking 1 gallon of water a day. Whoa, this has been such a wake up call for me. I am LOVING the water, but not loving the bathroom trips. It's still too early for me to notice much, except that I am not snacking as much nor am I craving too much in between meals. 

Are your bookshelves exploding? Mine are! One thing that I am doing to solve this is to get a group of people together in my home to swap and sell our books! I am setting up tables throughout my home and we will be set up to swap books for other friends or sell them if we cannot find a trade. I am very excited about this and will keep you posted on how it turns out! 

Teach the alphabet & letter sounds in no time!

A great way to teach letter sounds and/or the alphabet is with coloring pages, get yours HERE!!
1. Day One: As each letter is colored, have them sound out and say each letter. 

2. Day Two: print out a second copy and do the same. 

3. Day Three: Laminate the colored pages and cut out each letter combo evenly from 1 of the pages. (Saying each letter and letter sound as you cut it out to make flashcards)

4. Day Four: Repeat Day Three!

5. Day Five: You now have a set of Memory Game cards. Play with a few letters at a time and build up to playing with the entire alphabet. As each card is turned over say the letter and the sound.

Enjoy!

Are you a thrifter? Flashcard collector? I am using a mug tree to hold flashcard collections. This makes them easy to find and also keeps them out and on display. I change them out monthly and I notice that they are always being thumbed through! 

Enjoy every minute my friends!

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Thrifty Thursday!

Happy Thursday! (Where oh where is Friday???) Today for Thrifty Thursday, I bring you a repurposed game! As you all know I love to use things for more than what they were intended for! Especially to make Thrifty Teaching Aides! So needless to say I was in heaven when I came across this fun find!

I came across this FREE game at a rare Tuesday garage sale today! The lady told me it was free due to all the missing pieces. Guess what? The pieces that were missing were the ones perfect for us!!
Adding in a ring of flashcards, a 1-6 die along with the pads of paper and jumbo letter die, we were ready to roll!  Each child gets 1 column on the paper (less paper used). Roll both dice and then write as many words as you can think of that start with that letter. The youngest just has to identify the letter and write it out 3 times on each line.  

After reading many awesome blogs about putting together fort kits for your kids, I quickly put one together for them, to buy myself some much needed laundry time! They were smart to work with our oldest son's bed as it has high posts perfect for this! I love what I found when I was delivering laundry to his room!

Thrifty Thursday!

Thrifty Thursday is here again! I always have to seem so many ideas that when Thursday rolls around, there is just no time for a post about thrifting! These finds are some of my best yet! Maybe because many were found in free boxes, but mostly because they are all excellent learning tools!

The 4 books were each had for .25 each: (For more info on each title, just click on it)

A trip to the Zoo

Guide to South Korea

BATS

Bats Night Fliers

3 Fraction Dice were in a free box! Can't wait to come up with a fun game to use these with!

Animal Counters and Math Cards were also in the free box! These are perfect for my kindergartner and pre-k kiddos, since they need to get started on learning these!

The 4 board games were .99 each and are each complete, in fact 2 of them were NEW IN PACKAGE!!

(For more info on these, just click on the title)

The Scrambled States of America

My kinder and 1st grader need to know all the states and their capitals and this is a fun tool to teach, while having a blast! I already own the game, so this backup is perfect for using in different ways! I plan on laminating the mini maps so that they become portable and wipeable! (New in package!)

Quiz-N-Learn Sight Words, I unfortunately cannot find any information on this game online, but it is fantastic! 

It's a sight word BINGO game that really helps to reinforce what they are learning through reading and flashcards. It makes word recognition and recall quicker!

Match It Shape Shuffle this was the other new in package game with everything still shrink wrapped! It's a great pattern and matching game! My youngest has a ball with it, but there are enough pieces and cards that multiple children can play it together!

Wiggle & Giggle, not quite a learning game, but it's awesome physical activity and these balls are perfect for a  variety of activities!! I'm actually taking them with us for an obstacle course I made!

 
Thrifty doesn't always have to mean thrift shop! I sometimes find and love great deals found in stores or make my own with coupons! I found these blocks at a church tag sale for .49 and they are FANTASTIC phonics block. I figured I would make up a great game for them and added in a 4 pack of dry erase boards from Office Max (.99!!!!) and a pack of Dry Erase Markers from Michael's! (1.50 with 40% off coupon AND an additional 20% off entire purchase coupon!!). This game has proven to be a favorite already! There is something about kids and wiping writing off a board!

Link up in the comments with your Thrifty Finds!!

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Thrift Stop!

After writing this post on thrifty teaching aids:

http://michellescharmworld.blogspot.com/2011/03/thrifty-teaching-aids.html ,

I have gotten many e-mails, to keep updating my fun buys! Remember that you don't have to go to a specific charity shop, just go into one! I for one can be a total store snob, I admit it, but thrifting is FUN! There are so many treasures you can unearth and believe me, I've often times found new in box toys and books and game sets that are perfect for lessons or inspire new ones. 

Today, I ran in just to do a quick check at the local Goodwill (snob about to come out here). I cannot stand this Goodwill and if I were the company I would invest in making it as nice as the others I have been to (every single other one) AND be more careful about what they put on the shelves (stained items, torn items, broken stuff etc.) The minute you walk into this one, you just get that ick feeling, BUT I figured I will give it a shot, since I struck out at my 2 other local stops.Go figure I found some great stuff!! 

I did take the time today to write them a customer note on their website with my receipt information, so hopefully that will help somewhat! haha!!On to the good stuff!

Goodnight Moon is HUGE, it's the Lap Size for the classroom and perfect for all 3 kids to see while I read at bedtime! The Vintage Clock is a puzzle too! This is going to be very helpful in teaching Roman the Time basics and we can also use the numbers in different games too! My favorite purchase was the magnetic Pattern Blocks and Book, these were in a ziploc freezer bag, so I put them in the red pouch to make it more portable. I then dug through my supplies and found a cute little iron on to pop onto the pouch to make it cute and my youngest son fell in love! 

I took an iron on patch that I had in my supplies and put it right on this drawstring bag I had and now this little set looks good as new and Roman has already started carrying it everywhere to play!

Goodnight Moon .79

Magnetic Blocks and Book .99

Clock .99

Total spent today under 3.00!!!

Thrifty Teaching Aids!

We LOVE board games at my house, but if your kids are like mine, the small pieces tend to wander off and get lost in that big black hole of nowhere! I Love to swing by the Goodwill and pick up any games that have small pieces that we go through like crazy! It's a super inexpensive way to build up extra pieces! As far as the game boards and extra pieces, we use many in crafts and others we just recycle if the local daycare doesn't need them!

This post is about thrifty teaching aids though! My kids are all at different stages in learning, but I find that if I get creative, I can use 1 tool many different ways! This week I stopped at the Goodwill with a purpose! I needed some letter tiles and I couldn't use Scrabble ones, because I go though those like crazy in my shop! As I strolled the game aisle, I found exactly what I was looking for! I picked up 3 games for less than 5.00 total with tax and had exactly what I wanted! Boggle Junior, UpWords and Quip Qubes! These games are some of our favorites to play normally, so I was able to replenish the games we had and still have loads and loads leftover for

our learning games!
With the letter dice from the boggle game, I love to use these by tossing them in my purse with a notepad and pencil. They toss 1 of the die and then they figure out how many words they can come up with (My daughter writes them down and my son just says them). It's a fun game to play at a restaurant when meals get too long or when waiting in line for something etc. The UpWords we use to spell normal words and sentences and then try to change the words up just like the game goes, only using sentences! We use them all for other fun stuff too!!
I had purchased these yellow teaching tiles before (at the Goodwill of course!!) and even though I got them for only .99, they sell for so much more money than that, if i ever wanted to replenish them! I knew I had to get creative!
I found this freezer bin at the goodwill for .99 and it was perfect to hold all our letter tiles! It gives the kids easy access to them and allows me to keep an eye on them too! This is one of their favorite tools for spelling!
I used the cards from the Boggle Jr. Game and put them on a binder ring, so that my younger two can flip through and spell the words they see! Perfect way to get them spelling and playing with words!!
My favorite find was the Qube game! It had all these cubes in it and they all have words on each and every side!! These are AWESOME for sentence building and also just popping in between words we make with the tiles! I sometimes have my daughter grab 4 of them and toss them and see what kind of sentence she can come up with!

Keep your eyes open and get creative!!!