About Me

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Welcome to my blog! I am blessed to be a first grade teacher at a wonderful school in Jacksonville Florida. I graduated from the University of North Florida in December of 2009 and I have been in the classroom since January 2010. I am a Pittsburgh girl at heart but I have loved spending the last 8 years of my life in Jacksonville! I enjoy spending my weekends at the beach with friends, or reading a good book at home. Last year I adopted a puppy from the Humane Society and I couldn't love her any more! She is a hound mix named Leigha. She loves to take naps while I pinterest and do school work :)

Monday, August 12, 2013

Updated Supply List

If you are reading this you probably got my post card today saying that your child is in my class this year. YAY! Thank you for checking out my blog already! This will be a place for me to share important information, update you on the things we're doing here at school, or just share something awesome that I found!

The purpose of this post is to give you my personal supply list. Hopefully you aren't an overachiever parent (oh wait that wouldn't be so bad!) who already bought the supplies from the Merrill Road list. But if you have don't worry we can still use that stuff! You will just find that I took off some things that we don't need, and added a few things that we do need!

So if you can't wait until after Meet the Teacher on Friday (or if you can't come to that) here is a list of the supplies your child will need for First Grade! I will be passing out this same list on Friday to all who can make it!



Ms. Bowes First Grade Supply List
* 1 – backpack WITHOUT wheels
* 1 – box of tissues (needs to be restocked frequently)
* 1 – pencil box (labeled with name)
* 1 - 1 inch 3 ring binder (WHITE, with slip in front to add a cover)
* 1 box – 24 count "skinny" crayons (regular, no glitter, etc.)
* 8 – glue sticks (needs to be restocked frequently)
* 2 bottles – waterless hand sanitizer (needs to be restocked frequently)

* 1 box – Ziploc gallon bags --BOYS (please no Hefty brand zipper bags- These hardly hold our materials!)
* 1 box – Ziploc sandwich bags -- GIRLS
* 1 spiral notebook (wide ruled is the best for first graders!)
* 1 ream – white copy paper (needs to be restocked frequently)
* 1– yellow  paper 2-pocket folder with prongs
* 1- green paper 2-pocket folder with prongs
* 1- red paper 2-pocket folder with prongs
* 1- plastic 2-pocket folder with prongs in matching transportation color:
car rider/walker- orange ; extended day- green; bus/van - yellow

* Optional but highly recommended:  1 pair headphones (ear buds or regular) labeled with student’s name. (for individual use during computer time)- Walmart has a few $5.00 pairs, or you can find them at the Dollar Store!







* Please purchase plain-covered materials without designs or logos. Do not label your child's name on the folders or binder, I will take care of that :)

Additional items we will need but are not required:
* disinfecting wipes or spray (Clorox, Lysol, etc)
* tape (scotch, double sided or shipping tape)
* snacks (pretzels, crackers, goldfish etc.- avoid sweets and "junk food")
* address labels (Avery 5160)
* Expo board cleaner spray
* colored printer paper or stationary (for newsletter and reminders)
* sheet protectors
* Tempera paint

Small toys and games are always accepted for treasure box treats! Think of me next time you clean out your child’s room/toy box!

I hope to see you all on Friday at 2:15!

Sunday, August 11, 2013

Back to School! Back to School!



Yup it's here! The night before school starts... for teachers at least, (the kiddies come back next Monday!)
As I finish up the school work for the night and settle in to enjoy my last evening of the summer, I am reflecting over the last 63 days of summer vacation. I definitely had a blast visiting my family in Pennsylvania and Ohio over the last few weeks. Here is my summer in review!

My brother David is off to college at Penn State next week. Here’s a picture of me with my brothers and sisters at his going away party up in my hometown of Latrobe PA. 
 

Two weeks later my sister Breanna got married in Pittsburgh. 

And now she’s packing up to move from Pittsburgh to Oklahoma City next week! Can’t wait for my first trip out there to visit their new place!

A week later my cousin Derek got married in Ohio. 

I was helping with the sound during the ceremony so I have an aerial view of the whole thing!

I'm so happy for my sister and cousin and I can't wait to plan more of my own wedding!!

In between all the weddings and family time I got to do some touristy things up north! 

Phipps Conservatory was absolutely gorgeous. 




The conservatory had thousands of flowers and plants for our viewing pleasure!
 

And I would love to spend more time at the Cathedral of Learning at Pitt campus. It looked like real life Hogwarts and had all these fun classrooms to explore. 

And best of all I got to relax this summer and enjoy the slow paced living in Ohio where I used to spend my summers. The landscape is breathtaking and the weather is amazing there in the summer! I was actually wishing I had jeans and a sweater at one point! 


One of my favorite summer past times is watching sporting events! I happened to catch a Pirates game..
 .. and you know summer is almost over when football season starts! I am so excited to watch the Jaguars play from this spot this year

and the Steelers from my TV so I can keep up with my home team!

My favorite part of summer is getting to hang out with my fiancé and sweet doggy Leigha! Here she is looking extra comfy on one of our lazy days!

All the reminiscing has put me in a good mood and a great mindset to start back to work tomorrow! I’m excited about going back and seeing all of my coworkers and hearing about their summer vacations!

Oh and in 8 days I get to meet my next class of first graders! Yay yay yayyy!

I hope you enjoyed my casual post since the next time you read it will probably be about school stuff instead of personal stuff.