A LITTLE BIT OF THIS AND A LITTLE BIT OF THAT

Hey gang, I have a bit of a potpourri post today.  (That's just a nice way of saying that I am all over the place at the moment!) Taking this all into account, I figured that I'd just toss this one up as a list of sorts today.  

ONE - SCKC CONFERENCE
Last weekend I spent time presenting at the SCKC 2016. The SoCal Kinder Conference is always a great time. The crowd is awesome and I love hanging with my bloggy friends. On a side note, if you were in my pre-conference math games session, I emailed out the slides, the activities promised, and a few other goodies. A handful of emails bounced back to me. If you're reading this and you didn't get an email, shoot me a quick note and I'll hook you up within 24 hours (kelleydolling@gmail.com). Some of the emails were difficult to read and I may have incorrectly guessed on a letter/digit. #eyeproblems

Love me some SoCal gals.  See you next year my friends!  

TWO - ONLY TIME WILL TELL
We just finished up our time unit.  Don't tell, but when I heard that we were adopting a new math program next year, I went a bit rogue and marched off the curriculum and toward the clocks. The kids ate it up and my little firsties ALL know time to the 5-minute now. I am running back to the curriculum before I get too caught up in my own thing and get busted, but this was a much needed and fun standards-based break :)  Check out just a few of the activities we found ourselves mixed up in . . . 

Licorice clocks are a great way to hook those kids into tellin' time!

Can't use candy . . . roll with pretzel rods instead :)

We did a little graphing game to keep the engagement high!
Students roll the dice and match it to the correct clock.

Amy Lemons' flip book was a huge hit.
Check it out in her awesome time packet >>> HERE

THREE - FEATURED FUN
I was honored to receive an email from Scholastic asking to feature one of my crafts in their recent Teacher Magazine issue. They shouted out one of my very first crafts (Flying Fact Families) and offered it up as a fun spring freebie . . . let's just say it quickly received a much needed face lift before it went into their mag :) Don't want to use it for fact families? No problem . . . roll with same sum, word families, pronouns, or just about any other concept under the sun :)

FOUR - OPERATION EGO BOOST
I will chat more about this whole idea in an upcoming post. However, I wanted to toss it out a bit earlier this year as this idea requires a bit of planning. With all that fun testing looming, why not leverage it to pump up our kids? I created a packet years ago called Operation Ego Boost and it also received a little face lift this past spring. It highlights oodles of ideas to help pump our kids up before, during, and after all those high-stakes tests. Oh, I should mention that this pack breaks all the TPT size rules for freebies. What can I say? I just couldn't charge for a feel good packet like this . . . it seemed tacky. So, this 30+ page collection is FREE in my shop. CLICK HERE to check out this packet in full detail. It has everything from editable signage and adopt a class activities to breakfast name changes, treat tags, and cheer line instructions.  

I didn't get too many quality pictures from last year's festivities.
Take a second and check out the packet. It's worth a little look-see :)

FIVE - A PERSONAL NOTE
I don't really like chatting about my health issues, but my cruddy post record and flaky response to emails these days deserves a little clarification. Here goes nothin' . . . some of you know that I was diagnosed with stage 5 endometriosis in 2009. This disease is actually how I got into blogging - I was out on my second surgery leave. Well, every few years it surges back and takes me out. I have the best doctor a girl could ask for (at Stanford no less) and he takes such good care of me. However, to help "fix" the problem at least for a year or two, I get to have surgery.  I am slated for my fourth date with the knife in a little over a month. 

So, if I fail to promptly respond to an email, forget to send you a revision on something, or leave the blog/social media silent for weeks on end, it's not that I hate you or that I am giving up on The Factory. It's just that I have to pick teaching and just surviving at the moment. This has all made me rather forgetful right now too . . . please just email me again if I miss something. You're not a bother and reminders are good for me :) 

As a added bonus, my district can't find me a quality long term sub and I am working a brand new school this year. GULP :( I am trying like hell to hold on as long as possible as I love my students and just can't abandon them yet. Call me stubborn, but this isn't the first time this mama bear worked with ungodly pelvic pain :)

Alright . . . so there you have it . . . a deeply personal number five. Now that I have finished typing, I can feel my face contorting and my blood pressure just shot up quite a bit.  BLARG!!!!  Please know that I am not trying to complain or make you feel sorry for me . . . this is why I tend to keep quiet about it. I just felt the need to be honest as to why I have suddenly vanished. 

With all this dirty laundry now aired, please know that I will hopefully be back in action in early summer. The blog and product creation have simply taken a back burner until I get cleaned out. Thank you for understanding and sitting through all that jazz.

On a final note, Endo indeed sucks @$$ and it makes me cry from time to time, but everything these days has been put into perspective. I know there are quite a few other secret battles that many of you are be fighting out there. My heart goes out to you as it's no easy feat to have "issues" when you are attempting to manage a classroom and life in general. Big hugs to you and your families . . . stay strong my friends.  

With that, I am FINALLY O-U-T and off to finish up report card comments :P Thanks for sticking with me. I will be back during my Spring Break with something useful. Our little week vacay is so close . . . I can smell it :)