Colored Pencil Necklace Gift

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My kids head back to school next week. As with most moms out there, I’ve got mixed emotions. This happens to me every year. I’m grateful for the opportunities to go into the world and learn and grow from others, but I’m sad to let them go. I love having them around.  Once we get into the groove of things, I’ll be much better.

The week before school starts, our area has a fun tradition of a Welcome Walk. We are asked to stay home from 5-8pm on a certain day, awaiting the teachers, and we generally don’t have any idea who they will be.  This year, we greeted the teachers with a little gift I’m so excited to share. I had pinned some fun things on my Back to School Pinterest Board, and went back to look for something fun to do. We decided on the cutest Colored Pencil Necklace, and wanted to make some ourselves.

Colored Pencil Necklace

Check out the tutorial on the link above. It’s a great gift, because it can be done all year. I shared this picture on instagram the night before of me drilling holes into the pencil:

Ryobi Power Tools

It was tricky to sharpen the extra short pencils, but it worked out just fine in the end!

Back to the welcome walk, it’s  a fun tradition our school does, often filled with anxious anticipation. This year, I wasn’t too stressed out, because I knew for sure my sons teacher, and my daughters teacher, I was 95% sure about. You see, my 5th grade son “looped up” with his 4th grade class and teacher. Our school seems to like to shuffle teachers around to different grades, and at the end of last year, his 4th grade teacher was asked to teach 5th, and our class had the opportunity to decide if we wanted to be in the class again–with the same kids. I LOOOOVED his teacher, so jumped at the idea. I had already done this “looping” with my daughter (her kinder class looped to first grade together), and at that time, I had lots of apprehension about the idea. Mostly because I think classmates changing from year to year is a good idea: Get to know different people, don’t get too set in the ways of the classroom. But I’m so glad I did that with her, and I think my son will enjoy it as well.  Here is my son with his awesome 5th grade teacher.

welcome walk

So that one I knew 100%.

With my daughter, I was PRETTY sure that she’d get my older sons third grade teacher. I loved her and she knew it. At the end of last year, I saw her in the hall and said, “I’m crossing my fingers my daughter gets you!” She said to put in a request on my teacher info form, and she will do the same, and it’s pretty likely it will happen. I don’t think requesting a teacher works unless you’ve had another child with that teacher, and you know that teaching style and personality is a match. SOOOOO, I was pretty sure, and VERY happy to see her on my doorstep again! Yipeee!

 

meet the teacher

{my son with the same teacher at the welcome walk 2 years ago}

pencil vase

It’s so nice for me that I already have a repoir with both of them, too. I was on several group texts with my friends during the Welcome Walk to see who others got, and happily my daughter in in class with a few of her friends, yay! That was my big uncertainty. My kids are both pretty easy going and flexible, so I don’t worry about them too much.

My oldest hits 7th grade–his second year of middle school–and I’m not too worried about that, either. He did great last year, and we found out that he’s in the Honor Band with his tuba, which he is VERY excited about (there are 4 levels and that’s the highest)! I am surprised being that both 7th and 8th graders are together in that band and they  only take 4 tuba players (out of the 16 or so), which blows me away. I am not a great enforcer of home practice, I think piano background helped a lot for him. He will also run cross country and track, excited to cheer him on there, he’s a great runner (after his dad).

middle school locker

My baby has one more year with me, I’ll do a co-op preschool like last year.

We are as ready as we are going to be for school to start on Monday!!!

If you’d like any back to school ideas, I’ve got a few (click on the image for the posts):

Printable Kids Lunch Jokes and Brain Teasers

Lots and Lots of lunch jokes!!

Back to School Ideas Our Back to school dinner, photo shoot, and a few crafts.

 

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