True Story...I have NOT: 1) Taken OFF my pajamas 2) Stepped foot OFF of my couch 3) Talked ALL day long! Seriously! I so did not feel exhausted until yesterday, I swear! Now, my body has been screaming at me all day to NOT MOVE! Thank goodness that I have two weeks to enjoy total bliss! :)
After this past week, I may need a few more of these worthless days. Since I figured that I would not be heading out for a night on the town, {I mean...who wants to put on makeup?!?} I might as well catch you all up on what we have gotten ourselves into this week. Then, I will begin feeling worthless again as I watch my 5th Christmas movie for the day {don't judge!}. ;)
On Thursday, we had our big time Polar Express Day. Our "to-do" list was crazy long this day as we were furiously trying to finish up all of our last minute craftivities, activities, and gifts! Call me crazy, but y'all I can't STAND to leave things unfinished before the holidays...much less...unfinished period. Does anybody feel me? So, on Thursday...it was GO BIG...or GO HOME day! In all seriousness, this is the hardest working class I have EVER had. They are so stinkin' sweet {most of the time! :)} and even volunteer their recess time to finish work {ALL on their own}. So, I am trying to soak up all of their sweetness to carry me through those years that
Maybe their hard work had something to do with this little friend that we had visiting from the north pole?!? Maybe! Just Maybe! I like to think it is just their love for learning! Ha!
On Thursday, we began by listening to a reading of The Polar Express and watching a few music videos on YouTube since I couldn't actually show the movie. While they watched the music videos, I passed out the hot chocolate! Here are a few pictures from my little cuties aboard the Polar Express!
Since we have been working through our graphing unit, after our little ride on the Polar Express, we graphed the way that we like our hot chocolate best. {Little idea courtesy of Pinterest}
We were also able to finish up our caribou research by writing our conclusion and creating our caribou craftivity to display our work. {Idea also courtesy of Pinterest. I am echoing Amy Lemons when I say...I owe this Pinterest...BIG TIME!}
So proud of their writing! I already have a big list of things that we need to work on come January, but they have worked so hard and are becoming very confident writers! {Can I get a Hallelujah?}
We recently finished up our nonfiction unit and have been working on using context clues to identify character traits. During the CAH-RAZY cyber Monday sale at TPT, I bought a wonderful unit by Lesson Plan SOS called Crazy for Christmas. We made these adorable little Santa's and used our clues from the stories that we have been reading to identify character traits. We worked on several other activities this week from the same unit and let me just say...the kids loved them to pieces! 
I am pretty sure that some of these little darlings look more like winter characters straight out of a snow globe. Ha!
What would the week before Christmas break be like if we didn't make parent gifts? This year, I decided to make ornaments for our parents since Pinterest was swirling with ideas. I let the students take complete responsibility for adding all of the details and they did a pretty amazing job! I am sure their parents will LOVE their gift.
After all of our hard work, it was finally time to PAR-TAY! Let me just ask you...does it look like we had fun or what???
Two Words: SUGAR HIGH!
My philosophy = Sugar 'em up and send 'em home! I so hate that I do not have more pictures of our wonderful hot cocoa bar, but y'all seriously...this was one WILD party and I got caught up in all of its craziness! So, here are a few pictures from our party table, games, and fun! {Side note: I had some wonderfully amazing parents who made this all possible! They are FABULOUS!}
I made gourmet marshmallows to dip into our hot cocoa. Ummm...about 5 minutes into the party, they were eating them like straight up lollipops. I swear, if we had about 10 more minutes of school on Friday, they would have been hanging from the chandeliers! OH.MY.WORD! It was too much! :)
Our Minute to Win It Games were a total HIT! Our two favorite?
Have Yourself a Hairy Little Christmas: One player became Santa and one player was the elf recreating Santa's famous white beard. The team with the most cotton balls glued {or should I say Vaselined} to their partners face won! To some, I guess Santa is a SUPER hairy kind of guy! They had cotton balls EVERYWHERE!
{note: also check out the Vaseline in one child's hair. Can we say crazy competitive?}
Light As a Feather: The object of this game was to stand a holiday pencil on your desk and manage to place a feather on top without knocking the pencil over. This was a game of TOTAL and INTENSE concentration.
LOVE their faces!
The funniest part of this game? One child SWORE his pencil was broken because it would not stay standing. What he neglected to see was his hands shaking faster than the human eye could see! HA! Bless!
AND....FINALLY {I know, I know, I have bored you WAY, WAY too long}...the photo booth was a total success! It was a great way to end our party. The kids adored it, but the parents were the true crazies in there! This little activity comes highly recommended for all holiday parties! ;)
Well, that's all I have for tonight blogging buddies! So, from my crazy classroom to yours....HAPPY HOLIDAYS, FRIENDS! :)
Disclaimer: If anything is misspelled or does not make sense...I am TOTALLY OK with it! ;)
