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I’m still tired!

Yesterday was my first official Christmas party as a classroom teacher.  It also happens that we don’t have room parents or parent volunteers to help with our parties.  And, also, my Friday special got moved to Thursday since the art teacher didn’t want them after a party.  I’m flexible like that.  It also meant that we had the entire stinking day together.  What’s a teacher to do?  Lose her mind.

Well, the morning was relatively easy.  We were going to start with our spelling test, then watch The Polar Express read aloud on Barnes and Noble online, and then watch the movie from my Netflix account.  I pulled up the book on B&N a couple weeks ago, and I made sure my Netflix account wasn’t blocked at school the day before.  All good.  Not!  Apparently it’s removed from B&N’s website.  No big deal, we’ll just skip that.  I head over to Netflix, get signed in, pull it up, push play and then get an error message.  Our lovely laptops provided by the school are not Windows.  It won’t run.  That’s two hours of my day that were planned!   AHHHHHH!

I’d even laid these out on everyone’s desks!  {Thanks to my partner teacher Erin for the note!}  This was NOT happening.  Thankfully Erin also gave me a dvd of a Christmas movie I’d never heard of so we watched that for the morning.

In the meantime, I found a cord that I could use to connect my personal laptop to my projector.  After lunch, after the crazies calmed a bit, we watched The Polar Express.  Finally!  The day was saved!  Sort of.  We enjoyed watching it with some hot chocolate complete with marshmallows, peppermint marshmallows, and whipped cream!  Why I waited until after the movie was over to do anything else, I don’t know, but I do know that will never ever happen again.

When it was done we had a little over an hour for our “party”.  A couple kids brought stuff to pass out.  I passed out two sugar cookies to each kiddo and walked around with frosting.  They spread it then sprinkled on some holiday sprinkles.  I made these adorable snowmen with mozzarella string cheese.

And then forgot to pass them out because I was running around like a lunatic.  January snack, anyone?

I looked at the clock and there was like 40 minutes left.  I still hadn’t done my craft and my special surprise for everyone.  Oh, and also, our color printer wasn’t working!  So, my gifts for my students with the picture of us in our pajamas by our tree.  Yeah, that didn’t happen.

For our craft, I found this multi-pack of foam balls from Dollar Tree.  I used the three sizes to make a snowman, then students chose a color for their scarf and hanger.  I used paint pens to decorate them.  Except, I forgot noses on like half of them and kept hearing “Mine doesn’t have a nose!”  “I need a nose, Miss Maguire!”  “Miss Maguire, you should have put arms on this!”  And then I turned and looked at my lovlies and told them I’d be right over to put some noses on and I said it in my quietest and sweetest voice.  I wasn’t frustrated, and stressed, or busy, or anything.

I used halves of toothpicks to attach the balls together and then hot glued them.  I also used the hot glue on the scarf and hanger.  It’s a super adorable craft and was a great gift for them to take home to their parents.  I probably should have done them throughout either of the movies during the course of the day instead of waiting till the end.  I probably could have assembled the snowmen ahead of time.  Live and learn, right?

My other surprise was not going to happen without reinforcements!  I ran across the hall and asked an assistant for help.  She came over and helped put Vaseline on the kids faces.  They then planted their face in a bowl of cotton balls.  They emerged with Santa beards for pictures!  To keep their anonymity I can’t share the pictures, but I promise it was adorable!

I also forgot to pull down the stockings we did that we filled with kind thoughts.  They’ll be there when they come back, but it just was not the same.  I think, in the future, I’m calling in help.  Or, we’re watching videos all day.  Or, starting with crafts and doing videos after.  Or something.  Anything’s gotta be better than that.

But, on the way out, I got a hug from my one kid who has never given me a hug ever.  And I screamed “It’s a Christmas miracle!” with a giant grin on my face.  And that exhaustion and frustration was all worth it.  All of it. 🙂

On a final note, this week this video from The Colbert Report showed up on my Facebook news feed and I fell in love with it.  I found myself watching it again today.  As I’m heading ready to head to CA to spend Christmas with my Marine brother, the group that performed, MusiCorps, touched me in my heart.  If you’ve not seen this, watch it.  It’s a beautiful song and this rendition touched my soul.  If you celebrate, Merry Christmas!

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11 Comments

  • Girl! I feel ya! I can totally relate to all those little mishaps and technical failures. Not this year, but in years past……although I can tell you, I spent all evening making little treat baggies of Reindeer Noses for the kiddos, then totally forgot to hand them out to the kids. They're sitting in my classroom until we get back from vacay. *slapping palm to forehead* I HATE when that happens! Enjoy your xmas break. : )

    Ali
    Teaching Powered by Caffeine

    Reply
    • Thanks! I'm going in tomorrow partially just to get everything ready that I forgot before! Ugh!

      I hope your break is/was restful!

      Reply
  • Love your blog! Remember…The kids who need you the most, will remember EVERYTHING you do! They won't remember if the movie played or not, they won't remember what snack they had, or when they ha d it. They will remember…their teacher was " SOOOO NICE!" & "I got a hug!" Enjoy your time off! Happy Holidays! Wendy 1stgradefireworks

    Reply
  • I was the exact same way…running around like a mad woman…I have magic reindeer food I wanted to pass out..forgot that, and then printed up packets of fun worksheets to do over break..and forgot to pass all those out!! :/ Oh well…It'll all get saved for next year I guess. haha

    Sarah
    teachingiscolorful.blogspot.com

    Reply
  • It doesn't matter how many years you do parties, they never get easier! Even when a movie is involved, it's still utter craziness! However, you're right that it's totally worth it in the end. =) Thanks for the cute snowman idea! I might be adding that into the mix in the near future!
    ~HoJo~

    Reply
    • Oh, it's like this every year?!? I think I liked the part of teaching that including walking around and briefly visiting parties, instead of manning the chaos! 🙂

      Reply
  • I'm only laughing because I've been there…did you at any point just stop dead in your tracks and say "Friends, STOP, just stop – Mrs. W. is going to go bonkers if this continues…let's all just smell the soup…now cool it down, again…."

    Still chuckling…but only because it's over and I know you're relaxing and enjoying yourself now!

    Big hugs to you, sweet, sweet friend!

    Holly
    Crisscross Applesauce in First Grade

    Reply
    • Of course if you said "Mrs. W" that would really mean you've lost it…in your case it would be Miss M" just in case you weren't sure…HA!

      Reply
    • Ha! There was a moment where I freaked out and yelled for them all to sit down. I had never yelled quite like that before. They all sat down at their seats and collected our thoughts. Thankfully it was the end of the day and I think we all needed a couple second cool down 🙂

      Reply

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