Must Haves Monday!

It's Teacher Week over at Blog Hoppin'!

 Make sure you get over there and check out everyone' "must haves".  You might find a few things to add to your WISH list like I have.  I have decided that I "must have" a laminator for home and a camo silhouette based on everyone else's rave reviews of both. :)

But for now, these are my must haves!!

1. First things first...gottta have some comfy shoes! 

I am a big fan of wedges.  I will wear them as long as I possible can this fall until it gets too cold and my toes start to freeze.  Then I will wear socks...but I won't be happy about it. My feet (and back) actually hurt less if I wear these as opposed to flats.

Clarks, Naturalizers, Danskos, & Nine West are some of my faves!

2. Flair Pens

Enough said.  These are the best...and you gotta get the big pack to get all the pretty colors.  GOT to.

3. "Fake Jeans"

(as  I like to call them)

You see...we don't have "casual fridays"  at my school.  So...technically if these cute skinnies from Loft are in red...or yellow...or pink...or mint green (my fave)...they're not blue jeans.  So...I think they are totally acceptable.  Right??

Also...my fiance does a mean job folding my trouser jeans  blue pants so they have that fancy crease down the middle...also totally acceptable.

I should have just added Ann Taylor Loft as one of my must haves!

And I love that they have awesome sales and ALWAYS 15% off for teachers...all you have to do is show your teacher ID!

 4. Hazelnut Instant Coffee

I don't actually love the taste of coffee, but I love the "idea" of drinking coffee...something about holding a warm mug!  So...this stuff Andy calls my "fake coffee" (Ha! Fake coffee and fake jeans...a theme??).  It's probably full of sugar and what not...but I love making a cup for my desk when I get to school. I also like to drink it out of my Bon Jovi mug...but that's a whole different post. ;)

5. Book Boxes (and lots of bright plastic baskets) from Really Good Stuff

I use these for the kids' individual book boxes for the Daily 5.

6.  Ticonderoga Pencils

Only pencils that don't make me want to pull my hair out!  You can sometimes find good deals on the big 96 count packs on Amazon!

7. Multicultural Crayons

These are perfect for the self portraits we do during the first week of school!  I keep this in a separate place in the room so anytime we're drawing people, we can get them.  So much better than everyone picking peach or brown!

And by the way, this is a precious book to read before you do your self portraits.  It gives fun, unique names for different skin color like honey, cinnamon, and amber! 


8.  LABELS (and lots of 'em)

I use labels for EVERYTHING!  One of my favorite things to do is print tons of "class sheets" with one label for each child so that anytime I need to put names on something..I can just grab a class sheet of labels and stick them on!



9.  Cordless Glue Gun

I have painted cinderblock walls in my classroom so I hot glue EVERYTHING to the walls.  It's the only thing that stays.  I even hot glued a pocket chart to the wall where our meeting area is and it stays just fine!
*I just realized the ironic thing about this "must have" is that I don't really have one!  My colleague down the hall does and lucky for me...she shares!*

10. Something sweet to come home to

...because after a hard day, that's all that really matters!

This is a picture from this morning in the outer banks.  Sawyer woke up at 4:30 am, ready to start the day! Sunrise on the beach turned out to be not such a bad idea...but I see a family naptime in our future.

Best wishes to those of you headed back to school today!  We are trying to soak in a few last moments of sweet summertime...but I'll be there soon enough!