Kindergarten Land

Well since my lovely friend Brittany is the ONLY person who reads this blog, these pictures are really for you my dear. I told you I would try to post classroom pics and I'm finally getting around to it. I was blessed to inherit a FABULOUS Kindergarten room this year. A veteran teacher moved to Australia and I was next in line for her room! It is amazing because this year I have 29 students...a far cry from 19 just 2 years ago. Let's just say, I am EXHAUSTED every single day.

This is the view from the door!

Free choice area where the Kitchen is....hot spot...let me tell you!

The Rainbow word club and Letter board.

My soup can is awesome! An original creation!

It is now covered with ladybugs (my kiddos) to show their jobs for the week!

So fun!

Calendar time!

The view from my office!

And there you have it! Hopefully you can now get a sense of where I am everyday! It's a lot messier now that the kiddos are here all the time, but it wouldn't be a real kinder room without a little mess!!





Just stoppin' by for a quick post...

I realize I have not blogged in close to a year. I like to do an annual post. :) But seriously, I never blog on here because I don't have a lot of blogging friends and with Facebook, everyone stays caught up there.

Let's see. This past year lots happened. But let's fast forward to now. School starts back in a week. I report to work this week but I have already been back "unofficially" to start working on my classroom. This was the very first year I did NOT recieve a pink slip! Yay! So I got to enjoy my summer without the panic of not having a job in the fall and what we would do for my share of the income. A great teacher who had been at Discovery for as long as it has been opened actually moved to Australia this summer so I was blessed by not only being able to stay in Kindergarten (I have never been able to stay in the same grade 2 years in a row!) but I also was given the chance to move into her room! Exciting! Her room is an actual Kindergarten room whereas mine was a regular room. Her room is much bigger and equipped better for Kindergarten. It is also attached to the other Kindergarten teachers which is SO nice. The best part is there is a bathroom in the classroom. Those of you who know me well know how often I pee! So I moved in at the beginning of summer and now I am arranging everything and getting ready for the new batch of sweet Kindergarteners in a week! I'm actually really glad to get back to work. It's some needed structure and routine! Perhaps I will take a picture of my new room when it's all ready and post it on here. That would require me to post more than once this year though....Hmm....

I thought I would share some recent pics of my sweet kids.

My sweet Scooter. Fresh out of the pool. That guy is a swimmer! He's had a rough summer but hasn't let it get him down! We are hoping his nerve damage in his back will heal over time and the numbness in his hind leg will go away. But for now he is happy and not in pain.

My happy Baxter bear. He sure is a happy boy. He still has a "puppy brain" and I love it. Well, sometimes I don't because he is almost 4. He hates the water so he was enjoying the shade on the patio.

Diva Penelope. Penny was being a model for a photoshoot this day. I was trying to get a good shot of her and she was NOT cooperating. She insisted on lying down for most pictures on her side. I swear, she is a floozy. But we love her to pieces!

So I am still making signs. I have a blog for my signs but since I haven't been updating it regularly I want to make it private so I can do some clean up on it. But school is starting and I honestly don't see that happening! I thought I would share some of my recent signs on here!

For a teacher friend for her classroom. Super cute! I think one day I might make one for myself....

GAK is an acronym or something. I don't know...I just take orders and make what they want! Anyway, I designed this entire board. The client just said it was for a garden and to fly free. So this was the result and I really LOVE it. It was extremely time consuming but it was for a great client who has bought 5 signs from me so she gets the best!!

I think that is all for now. Let's see how long it takes before I post again.....

Alot can happen in a YEAR!

So I thought it would be fun to post a blog since it's been well over a YEAR since my last post. See, my problem with this is that I only have 2 people who read my blog. Not that I don't care about updating you Brittany and Kelsie, but it seems like so much work for 2 people who see my posts on Facebook on a daily basis. Regardless here I am posting. But literally as I type this, I realize I have nothing to post about. Hmm...let's see what I can drudge up.

Yeah...I got nothin....

New Discoveries

Well I know it's been awhile since my last post. I doubt I will post very often anymore. I figure for the two people who actually read my blog, they can find out these updates on my Facebook. Anyway, school started this week. I was called on the Wednesday afternoon before and told I would be teaching at Discovery Elementary. So I moved all of my stuff back there on Thursday morning. I was assigned First Grade. Although I was sad to not be in Kindergarten, I was happy it was still the little kids. My class is interesting this year. It's still early so I will have to see how it goes. I did get to have one of my cute girls from last year. She moved over the summer and enrolled at Discovery. She ended up in my class and I'm very excited!!

We are starting the wedding planning. We are close to setting a date. Things are going well. The pups are crazy as ever!

That is all for now!

Just a bump in the road...

So I had the wonderful intentions of posting more regular for the 2 people who actually read this, but as the title states, I hit a bump in the road. I had moved my classroom and unpacked at Discovery which was to be my new home next year. I was actually really excited about this new adventure as mentioned in the last post. But because our California government continues to dig deeper into debt, they decided to cut education EVEN MORE. Over half of the cuts in California have been made to education. I guess they figure, we don't need smart people in our state. Maybe it's because it might be easier for our government officials just to leave the state when it gets really bad!! Unfortunately, those of us with homes, family, friends, jobs, etc. don't have that luxury. Anyhow, enough of my venting. My district did not do layoffs in March like everyone else. It seemed like a dream come true. More like, too good to be true. They decided it would be necessary to do layoffs in June though. So I recieved my pink slip and am merely waiting until the final decision is made. It's not how I intended to spend my summer, nor is it fair that I have to play this waiting game. So my bump in the road of life has prompted me not to post any updates. It's been a bit depressing.

However, life does go on. I was in Las Vegas for our national dance competition earlier this month. Although the competition was smaller than ever, we still had fun. Our girls did really well. My little girls did fabulous! They won 2 times in different categories. They also won in the Platinum competition. My little sleeper dance though, Classroom Chaos, did really good too. I was shocked when they announced it had won 1st place in the Platinum competition out of 68 numbers. Coincidentally, we tied ourselves for that place. Anyway, it was a good week. I was ready to come home!!
My little girls

Lauren and Kya

The four of us.

Me and Kassi before the banquet.


Until next time...whenever that will be.

It feels good to be back!

Yes, I am aware it has been awhile. Now that school is officially out, I can begin to unwind...well sort of. There are still some busy things ahead, but the one obstacle that is school is done for now. :)

Let's see. School is out and I am super sad to see SOME of my Kindergarteners go. I got really attached to a few. I found out in late April that although my district blessed me with not cutting my job, my school (Endeavour) was one teacher over for next year's enrollment numbers. What does this mean you ask? It means I was bumped to another school to be determined at a later date. Well I waited for around a month. It was agonizing. I was so grateful to have a job but at the same time it was depressing to be leaving my school as well as my grade level. My assignment was looking like 6th grade which anyone who knows me will tell you, is my biggest fear!! Then it looked like 4th grade which calmed me down a bit. But the wonderful day I was informed of my final assignment was a happy one. I will be teaching Kindergarten at Discovery next year. Although I am sad to leave Endeavour, Discovery is a fabulous school, close to my house, and most importantly, I get to stay in Kindergarten. I am in the process of moving my classroom over there and am excited to see what next year holds for me. Wish me luck!!

This is my class from this year. I will miss seeing them next year as big First Graders!!


Things at home are going well. Many people keep asking about our wedding plans. Well as you know, the state of California has a temporary seat in the toilet. Education has taken a huge hit. I was able to avoid the first round layoffs in my district, however, there is a such thing as 2nd round ("last minute") layoffs which can occur Aug. 15th. This is terrifying. Plus even if I pass this round there is the fact that the following year will be worse. Basically we are worried that I will lose my job and we will have spent a great deal of money on a wedding. So the planning has stayed at a stand still. My fabulous friend Heidi has given me lots of ideas to save money, so I am hoping to figure something out.

This is my cute little family.


We officially began the summer of swimming!! Our pool is great and the dogs love it too! Scooter is a great swimmer and will jump in for virtually any toy!


Penny is just too cute. I had to take a picture with her!!


Hopefully I can keep up with blogging on a more regular basis. Until next time...

The Promise

So yes I am aware it has been quite some time since my last post. But in all honesty, I don't have much to post right now. However, I am saving up some stuff to post and soon I will have enough to warrant a decent blog. So this is my promise.

Scout's honor!

January is a good month...

So many wonderful things happened in the month of January! For starters, my birthday was January 19th. I was given the day off of work thanks to Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. It was a nice break and birthday!

Next we bought a house. I waited to mention anything until escrow actually closed. I know how things can happen and I didn't want to jinx it. But escrow closed on January 26th and John and I are now the proud owners of a new home! I took some pictures this weekend of the outside. I wanted to wait on the inside pictures until we have done more work.

The front.


The backyard



John's favorite part...the built in BBQ


My favorite part...the pool


And the final wonderful thing that happened in January....John asked me to marry him and I said yes of course! Unfortunately I tried to take pictures of my beautiful ring, but it's so sparkly that all the picture does is glare. So no pictures. If you want to see it, you will just have to see it in person. It's prettier that way anyway!

Well, we will be busy working on the new house in the coming weeks. I will post pictures when I can. Until then....

More cute Kindergarten quotes...

So I just have a few more quotes from the Kindergarteners at school. They say the funniest things!

*One of my girls yesterday told me she got me a present for Christmas. Then she proceeded to tell me "you can put it on your fridgadator!" Yes, I said fridg-a-dator!! That is how she says refrigerator. Too funny!

*Today at school, Santa made surprise stop in the classroom. There were 3 classes in one room at the time watching The Polar Express. When Santa came in all the kids started talking and shouting things to Santa. One of the hilarious girls in my friend Dana's class said, "Santa I texted you yesterday. Did you get it?" A 5 year old told Santa she sent him a text with her wish list!! I guess writing letters is out..texting is in! Santa also told the kids his reindeer were in Alaska. One of my kids said..."Miss Clanahan, Santa's reindeer are at the North Pole." Ah yes, Santa..get your geography right!

*We have to test the kids on a variety of things. Like stating the days of the week, saying the flag salute, counting, etc. Well my friend Heidi was testing one of her boys on the flag salute. When he got to "one nation under God," his version was "100 dalmations under God." That is definitely one that I haven't heard!!

*This next one isn't really a quote. But it is a thing they do. So I have this one boy...I mentioned him in previous posts. He loves to play in the sand box at recess. So after lunch the other day, he is like "Miss Clanahan I have sand in my shoe." So I told him to stand by the door and dump his shoe. This is a common thing and I didn't think anything of it. But then he started to take his gloves off. His gloves were FULL of sand...with his hands in them!! Then he takes off his shoes and I kid you not, he dumps enough sand to build a small castle! Then he takes his hoodie off and dumps sand from his hood! I asked him what in the world do you do at recess? And of course his answer was plain and simple..."play in the sand box." Well there you have it. Why did I even bother to ask?! So today they got to wear pajamas to school. I told them to be careful at recess not to get their nice jammies dirty. This same boy raises his hand and says "we shouldn't play in the sandbox!!" And what happened after recess...covered in sand! So much for his great idea!

Well that is all for now. When I have some really good ones, I will post again!

Wow. I really feel productive! I managed to upload tons of pictures AND update my photos on Myspace...apparently it has been several months since I did that! So that made me happy.

Anyway, this will just mainly be a posting of pictures. That's what everyone wants anyway isn't it? Anyway, a week ago was my dog, Snoopy's 17th birthday party! Yes that is right...17 and birthday party. I got Snoopy when I was 10 years old. He is the reason I am in love with daschunds. He is a unique dog. Not only has he managed to live longer than most dogs, but he is the smallest daschund ever! Keep in mind he was born before the "mini" dog craze. Before people were breeding to be small. In fact, when he was born, my grandma didn't want him because he was the runt. His brother was three times his size. She wanted the big one because that is what they were supposed to look like! I am so happy she "had" to take the runt. Snoopy is getting old and he can barely see anymore. I think my Dad realizes he doesn't have much time left. So he proposed the idea of a birthday party complete with cake. So we went over there and celebrated my dog's birthday. You will see it is a real cake complete with candles. Scrappy (the much larger dog) actually started taking large bites of the cake before we had to take it away from them. This is my favorite.



The doctor's office I used to work at for many years and just prior to my teaching job had their annual Christmas party. Naturally I went. I worked the majority of the year there...and even if I hadn't I would have gone anyway! :) I miss my people!! Anyway, it was "Black and White" and I had a lot of fun.

Before we left...


John and I at our table!


And of course...Natalee and I. It wouldn't be a party without Natalee!!


The other day I took this picture with Baxter. He is such a sweet boy. Sometimes he drives me absolutely crazy though!!


That is about all for now. We have 2 more weeks of school left! YES!! I am counting down!! I can't wait to have 2 weeks off from work!! Until next time...

Oh the things they say...

So my kids are full of funny stuff. On a daily basis they say things that crack me up. I thought I would share a few on here.

So I have a student who I was testing. I was showing him letter flashcards and I wanted to know the sound for each letter. Each letter he replied with the same sound of "eh." So I was thinking, okay, he doesn't know his sounds. So I kept testing hoping he would know some. Well about halfway through he looked at me and said, "Miss Clanahan, this is easy." And he was dead serious. He believed he was doing an awesome job!!! It was all I could do not to laugh. He was so adorable! Good news..he has progressed and knows more sounds now.

Another student I have took an item from my classroom. She told her parents who in turn told me at Back to School Night. They said she was going to return it tomorrow and apologize. So the next morning sure thing, she popped on over and said, "Miss Clanahan, I'm sorry I took your bunny. I hear you are very disappointed in me." -I am NOT lying. Those were her EXACT words. I about died. I remained serious and told her I was very sad that she stole from me.

This same little girl also calls hand sanitizer, "hanitizer." I don't correct her because it's absolutely adorable!

The student from earlier who said "this is easy" also did another funny thing. I was giving out candy as a reward for knowing their number. Anyway, I kept calling it candy or treat. Well about 10 min later when we were outside at parent pick-up he told me, "Miss Clanahan, I gotta tell you something. This isn't a candy. It's a Starbusrt." Once again he was very matter-of-factly. I smiled and said thank you for telling me!!!

And one of my sweet little boys had the hardest time saying my name. So he was calling me Miss Hanaclan. I thought it was so cute that I didn't want to correct him. His mother later told me that she worked with him every night to get it right. He now says it right and I am a bit sad because it was so cute!

I'm sure there are a million other things but for now that is all I can think of. When more arise, I will post them.

Until then...

Happy Halloween!!

I realize that it has been awhile since my last post. However, this post will be full of pictures!! So hopefully that makes up for it just a little...

Things have been going well in our life. School is keeping me busy, but of course I am having a great time as well! John is still working at KSI and doing a great job! Halloween in Kindergarten is an interesting time...and by interesting I really mean INSANE!! The kids were soooo excited! Here are some pictures.

I dressed as Dorothy! This is me before I left the house. It was supposed to rain and I wanted one decent picture in case it DID rain.


I happened to have a couple of twins in my class. We had to take a picture!!


This is my class after the parade on Friday. Aren't we cute?


Earlier in the week my class went to the Pumpkin Patch.


And of course...it wouldn't be Halloween without pup pictures!!




The first picture I found on my camera. John had put poor little Socks in that shirt and she wasn't too happy. Needless to say, Scout stayed in hiding during that time!

That's pretty much all I have to post right now. Until next time....

The Kindergarten Update...

Life in Kindergarten...is well... SUPER FUN! I can honestly say I am having a lot of fun with my class. I have 19...however, I lose one student tomorrow and my new count will be 18..exactly 9 girls and 9 boys. Makes same sex groups of 3 quite nice. I was exhausted everyday after school, but this week I have gotten a better system and am not AS tired as I was. I think I can really get the hang of this. I'm a slacker and haven't taken pictures of my classroom. I have pictures of my students, but well, that isn't very fun to look at 18 kids that you don't know. I love Endeavour (my school). It is absolutely wonderful. Everyone has been really nice to me and is making me feel like it is home.

As for dance, I have been teaching my same two classes on Thursday nights. My new batch of girls isn't what I'm used to. I have a lot of new girls who just aren't at the level they should be. It makes my choreography a bit more difficult but I can manage. I am enjoying whipping their butts into shape! But then again, that's my forte! Company will start next week with a meeting and officially the following week. I am excited because I can do more work this year, but we lost a lot of girls this last year and so I'm bummed about that. Brittany (after baby) and Kelsie (when in the state) I am leaving this as an open invitation to come take my tap and/or jazz classes on Thursday nights. It would definitely liven things up!! I think Desiree will even come take when she is in town!!

Anyway, that is pretty much all I have to update right now. I hope to have some classroom pictures up soon!!

So Much to Post...So Little Time...

Okay, so yes I am back. I know it has been awhile, but it has also been quite eventful. Let's begin with Las Vegas. This was in July. The girls did great and I have pictures from banquet night!!

This is actually the night before banquet. Kassi and I went to N9ne Steakhouse at the Palms that night. It was a fabulous night, but I really hate being photographed next to Kassi! She is such a pretty girl!


Me, Kassi, and Aunt Jenny on banquet night.


Kassi and I on banquet night!


All the older girls!


And Brooklyn is just too cute not to include! She asked to take a picture with me. She is so little! I love it!!


Moving on...next we went to our friend Brent's wedding. We know Brent from both Original Mike's and La Cave (the restaurants we worked at in Orange County). We had a lot of fun and got to see our La Cave friends! We miss them tons!!

Our dear friend Josh. He is angry we haven't move back to Orange County yet. He keeps offering to help us move. It's really quite sweet.


John and I


Which brings us to NOW. So, I started my school year off as a sub again for Kristen Neuman's 5th grade class. However, the budget caused so many cuts that the districts had over enrollment in many places. This forced them to hire more teachers the first week of school. So, if you hadn't heard yet, THAT is exactly what happened to me!! I interviewed the Friday school came back with Fruitvale and on Monday was hired to teach Kindergarten at Endeavour Elementary!! It's a dream job and I'm so excited!! I got to set up my classroom this week and on Tuesday I start with my full class! I'm nervous and excited!! I miss my 5th graders, but Kindergarten is one of my favorite grades!! I love it!

Here is John and I celebrating the night I was hired! I chose Tahoe Joe's! YUM!!


My classroom is super cute! I will take some pictures and post them eventually. I have already been so busy and it's just going to get busier for me! I promise to post as often as I can. But hey, I got like 3 good events in this post. :) Let's give me some credit!

Until next time....