Now I Can Breathe a Little

     When I started teaching, this time around, I came in with the vaguest of plans. I was going to have a day to chat with the kids, since I only actually knew one of the classes, and then we would have a day of some fairly easy review work. It's rough starting into new classes, let alone 4 new ones (and one old one) a quarter into the year. It is even harder going from being the para in the classroom to the teacher. But I have done it before and I was sure I could do it again. If only that nagging voice that tells me I don't know chemistry that well would get out of my head... I can learn it. I have excellent resources (teachers!). 

     So I had my day of chatting with the kids about expectations, both mine for them and theirs for me as their teacher, and Friday we did some review work. Nothing horribly taxing. We had a weekend and Monday morning was not too bad. Tuesday wasn't bad either, but then Ethan told me that he got a call to pick Travis up from school. We had to bring him for a COVID test before he could come back to school. So I got coverage for my 7th period class, missed my prep (6th period) but had enough of a plan for Monday after the Thanksgiving break to make it so I wasn't completely freaking out. Travis does not have COVID by the way. Or flu A or B. He has a cold. And it's mostly better. 

      Anyway, so we came back from Thanksgiving break and I had to wait in line in the copy room, I had way too much to copy to get ready for my first 4 classes, and then for some reason every packet had an extra blank page in between every printed page. So I had to pull all of those out to even make the packets. I managed but it was a rocky start to the day. But then I managed to get a bit more prep done for one of the classes, and just enough ahead on the others (as in, plans for the morning), that I didn't leave school in a panic. Mostly. Tuesday morning I got the copies done quickly that I needed for 2 of my first 4 classes, it didn't take forever, and I got back to my room in time to start getting things sorted. And then I took a day to let the kids work on their own, instead of having the majority of the class time us all working on things together. I reminded them to ask for help if they needed it, checked in every now and then, motivated some to get working or to keep going, and eventually got through the enormous amount of grading that has been piling up since I took over. OK, it wasn't huge, but it was a mess, sort of everywhere, and I needed to get that taken care of to clear my head. And I did. 

     

       This bulging folder is all of the graded/checked assignments since I started. Sure, it has not been a lot of days, but now it is all finished and I have a master list of every class, with every kid in the class, and every day, with their grade from that day's work, so when I get a refresher on how to use the grading part of the computer, I can actually put grades in the portal for everyone. Definitely progress was made. 

      During my prep time I also managed to get plans together for more days, for most of my classes. My biology class I think I am still only one day ahead, but I have material gathered and just need to get the details worked out and I believe I can get several classes ready. I also managed to find my desk!

       I only started on November 18th. The 19th was the first day we did any work. Then we had the 22nd and 23rd and after that was break. Monday the 29th had me rethinking my life choices again, but then by the 30th I remembered that I can do this. I am also insanely organized! So everything should be fine. Now that I am caught up I can work on finding things for the kids that are a bit more creative. Most of them seem to like that. 
 

Legacy Miniatures

     I forgot about another recent purchase that I could have added to my Black Friday Haul list. I ordered a bunch of awesome miniature food from Legacy Claussen, who is Joan Yount's granddaughter. They just seem to be a super talented family. Not only is Joan an excellent doll maker (and tack maker), her daughter, Mandy, is also an excellent tack maker. And now Mandy's daughter, Legacy, is making miniatures. And I am excited about it! 

     Yesterday my package arrived and I was prepared for little ziplock bags or folded paper towel, which is how a lot of us ship things. Legacy's stuff had a very nice, very professional presentation. I was immediately baffled though, I only ordered three types of miniatures. 

    I got these incredibly realistic oranges that look good enough to eat. 

These super cute strawberries, which again, are super realistic. 

    Let's talk about these cookies for a second. Holy cow these look so real! All of these photos are horrible kitchen table cell phone pics taken after the sun went down. And the food still looks amazing! I don't yet know what I will do with any of it, but does that really matter?

     The mystery package (when flipped over said free gift, lol!) was some potatoes. Another incredibly realistic tiny food item!

     Legacy has an etsy shop, LegacyMiniatures, and I can say that her work is definitely top notch. If you are in the market for some really nicely made miniature items I suggest you check out her shop! I know I will be checking back often to see what new items she comes up with. 
 

Black Friday Haul

       Have you noticed that over the years things take up more and more time? "Special" times of year are no longer a day but can be a week or even a month, or more? That is happening a lot with special sales (which is why "special" was in quotes above). President's day sales used to be a day and then went to a week. I have heard of them being a month as well. Black Friday used to be the day after Thanksgiving, and still is, but it also can start much earlier, and often does, and goes much later. 

      I did some Black Friday shopping this year. I usually do. This year I also installed the honey browser extension, which made finding online coupons so much easier. I started my shopping searching out my own coupons, which is not impossible, but often not super easy. I started with a pair of boots I had been seeing in my Facebook ads for months. 

      I may or may not actually be able to wear these boots. I have a lot of issues with my ankle and the less-than 2" heel height may be too much for me. But I really love these boots! They are all handmade leather, at least according to the claims of the website, and so much more colorful than anything I have bought before. Pretty much I wear black shoes. Black boots, black flats, black sneakers, black sandals. But I feel that everyone needs a pair of red shoes. And these are a nice dark red (they are not actually burgundy, even though the photo sort of makes it look like it. Not only were they already on sale on the website but I found an internet coupon that made them even less. The boots are on this website.

     And what do you have to do when you buy an awesome pair of boots and almost all of your socks are ankle socks? You have to buy new socks. Now I am a sock snob, I admit it. I pretty much only wear Bombas socks, and have for years. Not only are they incredibly high quality socks, but for every pair you buy a pair is donated to people in need. For people without a home socks can literally be the difference between life and death. 

     Anyway, I am a big fan of Bombas socks. This batch that I bought (with a coupon I found!) will last me more than a year. Typically, I have been buying 1-2 new pairs a year to supplement the ones I already have. You know that brand new sock feeling? That lasts for months with Bombas socks. So yeah, they are very pricey, but they are great quality and you are also giving to people in need. If you need/want great socks, here is their website.

     Next on my list was more Overtone. That is how I get the colors in my hair, conditioner. Yes, I do get it bleached so the color actually shows up, but the bleach is about a once a year thing. Then I condition in the color. I was all out of pink (that is not OK!) So I put in an order. Overtone was having a black Friday sale, 40% off I think, so I stocked up. I definitely like to save money. Here is the website where I buy my fun colors.

       People who know me well know that I love Ulta. They have a great mix of drugstore and prestige brands which makes it a very convenient trip. I also am a member of their club so I get points when I shop. And they send me sales emails. A lot. This time of year is usually the only time the prestige (expensive) brands go on sale. They are pretty much always excluded from coupons so it is hard for me to talk myself into some of the high-end stuff. But the skin care I use is high end, and a few of my favorite makeup items are high end. So I put in not one, not two, but three orders with Ulta in the past couple of weeks. 

     Why not just one Ulta order? Well, Ulta likes you to come back and keep on shopping. So they parcel out the sales and sale items. I found a bunch of things I wanted for myself and for some gifts and ordered them. Then I got an email about sales on some of my favorite pricey things, so I ordered them (40% off is nothing to sneeze at!). Then I got a coupon in the mail that was 20% off any single item, including prestige and fragrance. So I went and bought a perfume that I love. Usually for perfume I buy the travel size because it is so hard to spend that chunk of money on the larger bottles. But the Valentino Born in Roma is such a favorite that I have nearly run out of the travel size. That is a sure sign that buying the full size (even the small full size) is worth it. And 20% off made it a lot easier for me to hit place order. Ulta's website is here (they have stores too). 

      It turns out I am also sort of a soap snob. I started using goatmilk soap several years ago and that seems to be the best thing for me. Especially in the winter. My favorite goatmilk soap is from Sage Meadow Farm, which is actually really local to me. I can buy it at Big Y (grocery store). But when they are having a sale of 21% off for Black Friday, and you get 1 bar free with a gift box of 6, it makes it worth it, even though you have to pay shipping.  Plus I am sure that box will be great to ship something to someone. And I likely now have enough of my soap to last me most of next year. If you are not local, and want some awesome goatmilk soap (and other goatmilk products) check out their website. 

     I have too many unpainted micros. Even after selling a bunch. Which means obviously I had to buy another one. Sarah Minkiewicz-Breunig shrunk her Otto resin. And he is tiny and adorable so I had to buy one. Obviously. Will I ever get him painted? Hard to say. Will he be adorable even unpainted? Without a doubt. If you want your own Bean (Micro Otto) you need to order by December 6th.

      I may have also bought an Evelyn Munday saddle. Again. It happens. But really, they are an excellent investment. They are gorgeous, well made, and definitely retain their value. The last one I bought helped fund my new camera. So, since I sold mine, I was in "need" of another one. This one will definitely be worth it. If you aren't already, make sure to check in often on Evelyn's page. She does not have a separate studio page from her personal page. And if you see something you like, maybe ask her about it. She's friendly, I promise. 

        I was late to the party for the StudioMaire sale. She had a whole bunch of her awesome English saddle pads for sale. And I didn't know about it until the next day! So I missed out on many pads that would have been perfect in my collection. I did pick up a few anyway. Because they are awesome. And because sometimes there are other colors besides pink. Sometimes. I don't know how I keep missing studio sales until after the fact, if someone has a trick to make Facebook show me important things, please let me know. For Maire's studio page click here. 

     I think there were some other odds and ends that I picked up this weekend. Did I spend a whole bunch of money? Yes, I did. But some of it was for gifts, and a lot of it is supported artists and/or small businesses. Do I think people will like this weird post about the things I bought? yes actually. For some reason people like to know what other people bought. I know I am not the only one that watches haul videos on YouTube. Not from every content creator, but from some of my favorites. Will someone be really pleased I imbedded links to all of these places in this post? Absolutely. 
 

Black Friday Live Sale; Before and After

          Guess who forgot to write a post last night? It was me. I thought about it, twice at least, and then it just went out of my head. It happens. I spent the evening with my family for the most part, and then did a bunch of reading. And I pushed all of the thoughts of printing shipping labels away. I was even mostly successful at it. 

          Before the live sale I had everything nicely organized and ready to go. At least that is what I thought. I think, this time around, I was even mostly right about things. My semi-live sale set-up is a storage tote for a desk, with my laptop, external battery (for my cell phone), sharpie, and my rules, schedule and trivia questions. I also have all of the different types of items nicely sorted. The plan was for a low-key, not crazy sale. Mostly I accomplished that. 

      The end of the sale had a similar level of organization, but also a whole lot of bags with people's names on them. The great thing about the semi-live sales is I have a really easy to look at record of who claimed what if anyone, myself included, thinks I made a mistake. The "loves" on each comment can easily show me who was first to claim. It doesn't mean I won't goof if two people with the same first name claim the same exact item. It happened the last time. I "loved" the comment of one of them and put the item in the bag of the other person. Oops. I did however just remake the item so the one who should have gotten it did get it. 

      This time around I didn't lose anyone's bag. Everything was paced slowly enough that I could easily resort when a new person claimed an item. I got behind on sorting and "loving" comments once in a while. Some of that was chit-chatting. Some of it was never actually knowing exactly how long I need to sort things. I think I did pretty well this time though. There were not too many times where things dragged. I didn't goof on my math and leave 13 minutes between items. I can probably cut down the time between trivia and the next item a bit. But in general I think the pacing is good. It still means that the sale is roughly 2 hours long. But knowing that ahead of time might be helpful to someone. It's kind of helpful to me. Anyway, I am now back to the place of struggling to come up with things to post about. Let's see what, if anything, I can come up with. 

 

Small Business Saturday

     So yesterday I had my third annual Black Friday Live sale. And really, I should be doing them for Small Business Saturday. But I have always done them on Black Friday. Which is a weird day really. A lot of people work on Saturday. Though I had it off and Elecktra had it off. A lot of people are out and about in the craziness that is Black Friday shopping. I did some myself, though mine was all online. 

       Anyway, I have a handful of items that are still available for claiming. I have this hunt seat doll in a navy blue coat. She has a bendy neck so she is great for over fences. I have four removable helmets that fit the Yvonne-type dolls; blue, pink, black and green. I have a red cross country kit. I have a whole bunch of green blankets still, and a bunch of the tan/black blankets. I even still have a bunch of mystery boxes. So if there is anything you are interested in, let me know. I also have add-ons which have a link in the post from August. The stuff is still available, even if the post is old. 

      Thank you to everyone that came to my sale, both the live portion and just to my studio page to claim. I had a good time. This one was pretty laid back, which I liked, though there was still enough silliness that people seemed to have a good time. Today starts the invoicing! We'll see how I do. 

Black Friday Sale Schedule

As promised, here is the schedule of when each group of items will post today at the sale. As a reminder, the sale starts at 3:00 pm ET on my studio page on Facebook. A full catalog of items is in this post. And there is also an album on my studio page. 

Micros-3:02

Lemondrop medallion: 3:03

Breyerfest Kaleidoscope: 3:04

Group A- 3:05

Group B- 3:10

Group C- 3:15

Trivia- 3:20

Group D- 3:25

Group E- 3:30

Group F- 3:40

Trivia- 3:45

Group G- 3:50

Group H- 3:58

Group I- 4:05

Trivia- 4:09

Group J- 4:13

Group K- 4:17

Group L- 4:21

Trivia- 4:25

Group M- 4:30

Group N- 4:38

Group O- 4:45

Trivia- 4:50

Group P- 4:55

Group Q- 5:00

Group R- 5:05

I hope you get exactly what you want! And in case you are wondering, I have made 1564 dolls to date!

 

Thankful

       I am thankful for so many things. 

I am thankful for my family, who are amazing people. 

I am thankful for my friends, both the ones I get to see in person, and the ones I have never met in real life.

 I am thankful for my jobs. Most of the time I like them both, and enjoying work makes the work a bit easier. 

I am thankful for my health. Even though I just had the first cold I have had in years, it was not a bad one, I am almost better. 

I am thankful for a warm home and food to eat.

I am thankful for my LHS family. So many people have helped me with supplies, plans, or just moral support while I transition to teaching (again) for an unknown amount of time. 

I am thankful for my crafting skills. I worked hard for them, but I am grateful that I have them.

I am thankful for patience. Working in a school after the last two years is a test of patience every day. Usually I pass. 

I am grateful for the model horse hobby. While it is full of drama, most hobbies are. And this one also has horses, and tiny horse things to play with. 

It's so easy to decide that life is hard, everything is bad, and we can wallow in our misfortunes. My life has had a lot of extra stress and trials recently. My mental health was wonky for a bit. But I can (and do) still sit back and think about all the good things. I have many blessings in my life. There are days I have to search for the good things. But if you look for them, you will find them. 

Happy Thanksgiving!

 

Black Friday Live Sale 2021 Catalog

       I always forget just how long it takes to do the catalogs and everything else involved with the semi portion of the semi-live sale. It is a ridiculous amount of work. But All of the items that will be for sale this Friday, November 26th at 3:00 pm ET on the Field of Dolls Studio page on Facebook, are below. I have ad-on items, which are in this post.  I know the title says August but I am mostly sure I still have all of those things. For how the sale works, please see this blog post. If you have any questions please email me at fieldofdolls@gmail.com. 

Little Elecktra is not included, just to show the blanket size.

hoodies

Cross country kits include vest with attached pinny, watch, and medical armband

Dog sets come with adjustable vest, blank pouches, and velcro tags that say service dog and search and rescue. 

Dog sets include a bed, food bowl, ball, bag of food (with food in it), a bone, a rope toy, and 2 other toys

bareback pads

lunch sets include a lunch bag with working closure, a sandwich, cookie, chips, apple and drink

lunches include a sandwich, chips, apple, pastry, and drink.

backpacks have working closure

Saddlebag sets include opening saddle bags with mesh pockets, 2 water bottles, a map, first aid kit, trail mix, cell phone, poncho, apple, hoof pick and pommel bags. 

saddle bag stuff is a map, first aid kit, trail mix, poncho, cell phone, hoof pick and an apple. 

cat sets include a bed, feather toy, catnip mouse, little box with scoop and litter, food dish and food bag with food. 

Removable helmets. Have multiples of some colors. 

Western pleasure dolls

Hunt seat dolls all have bendy necks for over fences. 

Casual dolls have fully haired heads and the casual western dolls have removable hats

Mystery boxes! No two are exactly alike! LOTS of new items!

Black Friday Catalog News

     So I know I promised to have the catalog for the Black Friday sale posted today but I am not ready yet! I will post it at some point later today. 

 

Black Friday Semi-Live Rundown

      I have done this post before, since this is not my first semi-live sale. Here is the link to the original post. I thought it might be slightly confusing since it was specific to the last sale. So I copied and pasted it into a new post and will edit it to make it relevant to the upcoming sale. If something doesn't make sense please let me know. Hopefully I will have time to answer. 

     My plan is to have a sales catalog published, here in the blog, tomorrow (Wednesday).  The blog catalog and other advertising photos (if I get around to those) will be posted in groups, like the photo below. Though they will also have prices on them this time since that was a request (can do!)

     The order I have them posted in the catalog will be the order the photos will go up on my studio page on sale day. I will have claim codes on the photos so when the photo pops up all you have to do is comment UNDER THE PHOTO the claim code. If you are the first to claim that particular item it goes to you. No matter what your internet speed, 2:00 (or the comparable time in your time zone) is 2:00 for everyone. The photos show up at the same time for everyone. Since you will have already seen the groups and how they are laid out you will know exactly where to look in each photo so you can see the claim code (which is not easily guessable, for fairness) and then just type that into the comments. 

     At 3:00 next Friday, November 26th, I am going to go live on my studio page on Facebook. I will not be showing you any of the items I have for sale. At 3:05(probably) group A (which is not the group A from this post, these photos are all from my test sale) will be posted on my studio page. You are more than welcome to watch me dance around in my room and pack bags. I am sorry to say I am much more chill during a semi-live sale. I still try to keep it fun. I still sing the alphabet and I will drink seltzer (note to self, get some more seltzer...). You cannot claim items by commenting on my live video. No claims count if you say them to me. Literally the only reason to watch me do the live is to have some interaction and for trivia. Probably. You never know if I might come up with some surprises. But to be clear, you do not actually have to WATCH me at the live sale to claim things. 

      So let me now explain in greater detail how you claim an item. Let's say you are looking at the micro pouches in group B and you absolutely LOVE the pouch with the pink unicorns. You know that is one you want to try for and the schedule tells you group B will be posted at 3:10. So at 3:10 you are refreshing your device like a crazy person and I am hanging out in my room talking to myself and calmly drinking my seltzer (though my current favorite is Limoncello La Croix...). You hit refresh over and over and then the group B photo is up! You see that the pouch you want is 55 so under the photo of group B (the photo with the claim codes) you comment 55. Really, it is that easy. And if you were the first person to comment 55, you will be the one that gets the pouch. Which I will say out loud on the live portion of the sale where I am chilling and casually packing bags and not running around like a crazy person. I will also "love" your comment so you know you are in fact the first person and the winner of the item. Easy, right?

      My plan is to probably have groups post about every 5 minutes. My plan is to keep the groups somewhat small so I have enough time to write on bags and sort items before the next batch comes up. I will also schedule in 5 minute breaks where no photos are going up but I will be doing trivia on the live. The basic rule is the first person to claim (It may or may not be the same order on everyone's device so I am still going by what shows first on my screen) will get the item. In the first 5 minutes the group is listed you may only claim one item from the group. So let's say group A goes live at 3:05. You can only claim one of the bareback pads. When group B goes live at 3:10 (so, 5 minutes later) if there is anything unclaimed from group A you can make a second claim from that group. Doing it this way makes it more fair for everyone. 

     So that is the basic idea. Claims only count if they are comments on the photo, the one with the claim codes, on my Facebook studio page, and if they are the first one. You may only claim one item per group for the first 5 minutes the group is listed. After the first 5 minutes anything unclaimed is fair game, even if you already claimed an item from that group. There are times during the semi-live sale where I get a little backed up (usually because I am talking...) and I may not get to a claim photo to "love" comments for several minutes. I will get to it, and announcing, as quickly as I can. 

     It really is pretty simple. All of the available items will be posted, with prices, on the blog, prior to the day of the sale. I will get a schedule out too so you know exactly when you need to check my studio page for what you want. You are more than welcome to watch the live portion, which is me hanging out in my room, singing the alphabet, and drinking seltzer. You don't actually have to. All the claiming will be done on my studio page. If you only want to watch me dance around, you can. There will still be trivia.

     So another burning question might be, how can we be in two places at once? How can we watch the studio page for the photos and also watch the live stuff? HOW??? Well, the easiest way is to have 2 devices, which is what I will have. I do the filming with my phone on a tripod and I put my laptop on a box and watch the page that way. Two devices is super easy. OR you can split your screen. I don't think you can do that on a phone or a tablet. But I know for a fact you can do it on a computer. And I am not going to teach you that. I taught enough people how to split their screen. You are on your own to Google that one. 

     Please let me know if you have any questions on how the semi-live sale works. 

More Lunches

     I mentioned the other day that I made a couple more lunch bags for lunch sets. One of them is with my black and white horse print...

     And one of them is with this pink/blue/black splatter print. I like both of them a lot. They each come with a sandwich (it's peanut butter Jennifer...), a cookie, apple, chips, and an energy drink. In real life I hate energy drinks. I think they are basically poison between all of the chemicals and sugar, and people drink them like water and are likely doing horrible things to themselves. But dolls can't drink these fake energy drinks and they work well in the lunch sets. So that is why they are there, lol. And I have them. 

     I also made up a bunch of lunch sets that don't have the bags. Partially because I ran out of time to make more bags, partially because I still had a bunch of sandwiches from when I made all the sandwiches, and partially because sometimes people just want food for the dolls and not the whole set. I like options. So the lunch sets come with a sandwich (still peanut butter) a pastry thing I don't have a name for, an apple, energy drink, and some type of chips. Each set has a different bag of chips, though everything else is the same. These are larger than the ones in the lunch bag sets. 

      I think I have now shared everything I made for my black Friday live sale. Some of the things I shared months ago when I made them. There will definitely be a catalog post that has everything all in one place, with prices. And more info on how the semi-live sale works coming soon!
 

Blankets

      I bought these 2 fabrics awhile ago. I am not even really sure when. I thought they would make fun little doll blankets, if I ever got around to working on them. I finally made up a pattern, just for small blankets, and I started cutting and working on the edges. The blankets don't take a super long time to make, but they do take a bit of work. 

     They drape incredibly well though! I think they would be great for a doll just hanging out wanting to be cozy, having a picnic, sitting by a campfire, or even for a winter trail ride. I went riding in a snowstorm once and we had a throw blanket across the horse's rump and wrapped ourselves in blankets. It was not actually the most fun ride ever, but it was an experience for sure. 

      I am almost finished getting things ready for my black Friday live sale. Which will be this Friday, November 26th at 3:00 pm ET on my Facebook studio page. I need to retake some photos, put together groupings, get prices on the photos, duplicate the photos and add the claim codes, schedule when all the photos go live... but I am getting there. I will have the catalog ready to publish soon and a post of the schedule so you know when to check my studio page for the items you want. 

 

Saturday

      I did not get a ton of doll and miniatures work done this week. Wednesday I scrambled all day at school to get some plans together so I had some idea what to do with the kids when I started teaching on Thursday. And even though I said I wouldn't, and I really didn't have time, I did do some more work when I got home. 

     Thursday went fairly well. I basically just did a chat and reset day with all of the classes. Which meant talking a lot, all day, with the first cold I have had in forever. I survived. The kids seemed to like that I asked what they wanted. There were some silly answers, but I had a lot of real stuff too. No homework (homework pretty much hasn't been a thing in a couple of years. And I always hated trying to figure out homework anyway) so that was an easy yes. Some of the kids asked for things like not to get called on unless they raise their hand. Some of them asked for not too much work (um, yeah, you learn better when you are not overwhelmed), and some other really reasonable things. One of my classes started out badly. The kids came in, were very obnoxious, half of them were late, they were CONSTANTLY on their phones, and it took about 10 minutes to get them to be quiet and listen to any of what I had to say. But we made it through. I decided that instead of starting off with yelling (not gonna yell, I hate yelling) I would have a reasonable conversation with them. It was challenging because they were so loud, but I got it to work. I managed to plan out some lessons, found some worksheets, figured we would do Bill Nye videos and questions yesterday in science to ease in to working and having a restart. It was a good plan. 

      Friday I woke up early so I had time to do a really excellent blend on my eyeshadow (which sadly does not look quite as awesome in my photo). And I need a bit of a brag, I am only wearing eye makeup. I have nothing on my skin except the smallest bit of highlighter on my cheeks. I just have really good skin. Plus I figured some really well done makeup would make me happy and confident. I was not wrong. 

      The flaw in the plan was I have some kids who basically hate every single assignment. It doesn't matter if it's a fun thing, like watching a video, they are mad about it because they don't want to do the questions that go along with it. They don't like Bill Nye (who doesn't like Bill Nye?) or they are just so much more intent on being on their phone and screwing around than actually paying attention. Some of the kids were excellent, and some of those excellent kids surprised me a bit. They did not respond well to the old teacher. At all. But they were polite to me and participated, paid attention... it was an interesting twist. 

      I had a class where I had to call the principal (really fast) to come in because one kid went after another and was throwing things. No one was hurt and the kid that was not the aggressor showed great restraint and just moved away from the other one. That was definitely not a great situation. The rest of the class was just fine. 

     My class that had been really tough on Thursday was not too bad yesterday. I figure if I pick away at the learned bad behaviors things will get better. My hallway neighbor commented to me that it has been so quiet for the last two days. I said I'm trying. Once there is some classroom management and cooperation, we can actually get into some learning. And that will be excellent. 

     Yesterday I did finally get into some miniatures. I made a couple more lunch bags and got some of those sets put together. I also decided to make some lunch sets that don't have the bags. Sometimes people just want miniature food. And I don't have time to make a ton more lunch bags, lol! I have one more surprise item, but I will do another post about that one. 

     So I am officially back to teaching, at least until they hire someone new. So it could be a while. It could be the whole year. I have a renewed love for Teachers Pay Teachers and really need to be careful that it doesn't turn into an addiction. One class has earned themselves a whole bunch of boring lessons out of the book by screwing around too much during the more fun lesson, but I will think of something a bit more interesting for them soon.