It's a BIG deal!!

Okay, I have SO many things buzzing around in my head to write, and I don't know where to start!

1. Father's Day!

Last Father's Day :)

Leading his kids to the cross, even when
we were young.

I love my dad! He is awesome, and is underappreciated! I told you last week about my Father's Day gift endeavors. Now, for my Monday Made It, I get to tell you about the finished product! I made him a book of 52 Reasons Why We Love You from the three of us kids! You use one deck of playing cards (52 cards) and write your reasons on them, hole punch them, and attach to binder rings!

 I made my reasons by designing them in an online photo editor, then had them printed out (4 at a time) on 5x7 photos. I cut out the reasons to fit my cards, applied one layer of Modge Podge onto the front of the card (where the number was),

and attached my reasons. 

After all the cards were dry, I hole-punched one card to be my template for the rest of them.

Then I attached them in order to the binder rings, and voila! Here is the finished product!

I LOVE how it turned out! And the best part- when my dad opened it and started reading it, he cried! I have only seen him cry a couple of times, it was so great. I loved creating this!

You could definitely do something like this for a thank you to someone who has played a part in the classroom! If you have each student think of two things to say, you would have your 52 easy! Parent volunteers, a retiring faculty member, a field trip, etc. The editor I used was Pixlr, and my font was Oh {Photo} Shoot! If you would like to see my 52 reasons, just ask! I can make a document for you. But some of my reasons, obviously, were personal to our family.

Because of my crazy weekend and Monday, I decided this would be my {LATE} Monday Made It! I'm linking up again with Tara at Fourth Grade Frolics!

2. While we're on the topic of 4th Grade Frolics, I have a HUGE exciting tidbit to share! If you happen to follow the link above to Tara's blog, you will see on the top of post, a crazy exciting thing! Here it is:

I WON HER BLOG BIRTHDAY GIVEAWAY!!!! {insert huge squeal, happy dance, etc!!!!!} I was just scanning through some blog posts yesterday afternoon for my hour break of time, and saw this!!!!!!!!!!! I cannot believe I was the chosen one! haha! I won a HUGE jackpot of awesome teacher resources!! This is probably the most exciting blog event yet! It is right up there with my 29 followers and my One Lovely Blog Award!! WOO HOO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

3. Now comes a fun little saga about my DIY adventure this weekend:

I wanted to do something else fun and creative for my Monday Made It, and I got a picture frame from Goodwill for $1.99 (YES!) a few days ago, so I decided to make this:

source

A Teacher To Do List! Definitely a necessity on my teacher desk!

Anyways, so I get out my frame

The Rose Fairy- looks friendly, right?

Yes. it looks like a perfectly normal frame. Then, I turn it over, and rip off the paper hiding the insanity, and find this:

See the TWENTY FIVE staples?! Yeah... I was not happy. But, being my persevering self, decided to take a whack at them and see what was underneath. Now, I realized once I pulled out the first staple, that these weren't the staples we use in our classrooms. These were STAPLE GUN staples. The ones you need a heavy pair of scissors and some elbow grease to get out of my wooden frame. NOT FUN. And this is only the tip of the iceberg.

close up of the staples

So once the gigantron staples were removed from the frame, I tried to take of the backing. Unfortunately, the backing was STUCK to the picture (remember the Rose Fairy?!). Strike 2! Once I pulled off the backing with the picture, I see the glass, broken in two, from the impact of pulling out the staples. Strike 3! YOU'RE OUT!!! Can you say major fail?! Oh well, I got everything out of the frame, and now I have to decide what to use it for! Hopefully by next week I'll have something to show you with that AND my teacher to do list in another frame!

4. The Dollar Tree!
Yesterday I was out running errands with my mom and stopped at the Dollar Tree! First of all, I could probably find a purpose for everything in that store. Second, I did find a purpose for about 15 things! Here's a picture of the purposed purchases!

I'm so excited for my future Made Its with these fun items!

5. What's to Come
I have a couple of big debuts coming up! The first is that I will be a guest blogger tomorrow on 

I'm super stoked about this opportunity! Make sure to follow this blog for my post tomorrow (Wednesday)!!  Second, I am making strides towards a TPT store! I will announce it when it comes! What would you like to see there? I'd love to help you make your classroom goals come to life! Third, because of my amazing giveaway win, I'm returning the favor! When my blog reaches 50 followers I will host a giveaway! To help me get there, invite your friends to follow me! Also, if you would like a product of yours included in the giveaway, email me at allieelliott@yahoo.com! I'd love to support you and get you more followers through my success!  Thanks for sticking with me through my catch-up post! Remember, check out my blog post on Second Grade Math Maniac tomorrow, and invite your followers to follow me so we can have a fun giveaway! Thanks for reading!