'Tis the Season!

I went to school today for way too long (5 hours..) to prepare for Christmas themes and the next three weeks before vacation. Since Thanksgiving seemed to be "early" this year, there were four weeks until Christmas after that break (now there is three). It seemed too early last week to start getting into Christmas things, so I tried to avoid the subject. Today, I met up with Erika and we planned Christmas! I am so excited for all the cute things we are doing. I find that planning takes way, way more energy and time than I could ever imagine. It is really not just "planning". You have to decide where you want to put things, what order you want to do things in, what you have to send to the copy center, what you can copy at school, what you need your parapro to prep, how you want her/him to prep the work, what you need to quickly prepare for possibly the next day, etc... It really isn't just a "let's do this at this time" or "we will do this then". This is when being a first year teacher kind of stinks. I really have a blank slate to work with. I can't go to my files and pull out everything I did at this time of year last year....because there wasn't a last year for my teaching career. This is just how to goes! You got to start somewhere! I also decorated slightly for the season. I put up a little, fat Christmas tree in my room. Yes, a Christmas tree in my classroom. I can't wait to see my kiddos' faces when they see it tomorrow morning....or if we happen to receive a letter from Santa, himself!