Winner, Sale, and *THE* Template for Responding to Reading

I'm back to my old blog design for the moment... though I loved my other one, SOOOO many other bloggers have that template... so it's this one while I wait for my check from TpT so I can buy a new, custom, just for me template!

Hooray and congrats to...!

You are the winner of 5 custom pages of stickers from My Teacher Stickers!  I'm e-mailing you right now!

If you didn't win... don't fret!  They are super affordable... and I hope you'll pick yourself up a page or two of stickers... and maybe some for your co-workers too!

Tomorrow begins a few days of meetings to get ready for kiddos next week Tuesday!  Woot woot!  So, I'll be making frantic last minute purchases this week, laminating, printing, and copying like crazy!

To celebrate (?), everything is 20% off at my TpT and Teacher's Notebook shops until Wednesday!  I'm lovin' this button I made for the sale-

My TpT store     or     my Teacher's Notebook shop

Yesterday I shared this "Respond to Reading" interactive poster I made on Vistaprint and had lots of requests to share the file- I tried to upload it to Google Docs in Publisher so ya'll could edit it yourselves... but it converted it to a Word document, which didn't work... so I tried to move it over to Word and it won't accept the table and I can't get the formatting right...

Here's mine:

So, here is a plain version of the file.  It's plain.  No Lilly Bimble graphics, as I'm sure that violates Vistaprint's terms by allowing someone to re-print graphics that they do not have the rights to.  You know what I mean?

So I tried to cutsey this up as much as I could without using any graphics so I wouldn't violate anything... It is a ZIP file and has a page for 25, 30, and 35 students.

Sorry it's not fancy... I don't want to make Vistaprint or Lilly Bimble mad at me so I'm just trying to follow licensing terms with printing and graphics!  You would just need to upload whichever page you need to VP and then order it as a large poster.

Hope that helps!

Responding to Reading- Interactive Poster

This just arrived from Vistaprint and I couldn't be happier!

Now, I can't remember which blog I saw this on, but someone else used VP to make an interactive "Respond to Reading" poster which is what inspired me.  So, sorry I can't give you a shoutout, mystery Vistaprint inspiration!

Anywho... this is the large poster (which wasn't free, but still inexpensive!).  So I made the file in Publisher, saved as a PDF, uploaded, cropped, and... there you have it!

So, now it's laminated so I can write a question at the top (that is me, learning how to write in D'Nealian... yikes!  I have some practicing to do!) and students will respond by taking a sticky note (inside the bucket hanging on the knob), writing their answer, and sticking it on the spot that corresponds with their student number.  The first question is an easy one, but I plan to do lots of higher level comprehension questioning with this one.

I do have four classes of 3rd graders I'll be seeing for reading... I'm thinking I'll mainly use this for my homeroom group more than I will the other three groups... but it would be a GREAT quick "exit slip" type of thing or way for students to be held accountable during read to self time as they could answer a question or write a way they've been using our comprehension skills in their reading.

I'm pretty geeked about this one!  I even got my first ever message from Vistaprint that my image may be too distorted when blown up to this size, but I decided to order it anyway and it looks great!

Don't forget to enter the giveaway for 5 sheets of personalized stickers!  It ends tomorrow... just check out yesterday's blog post!

Happy Saturday, peeps!

A Desperate Plea & Some Vistaprint Tips and Tricks

Happy weekend friends!  For those of you who just had your first week back, enjoy your two days off!  I'm not bragging here... just sayin'... but we don't go back until September 4th in Michigan!

I'm going to start off my post today with a desperate plea.

Last year I received two Nooks from Donor's Choose and had to leave them behind when I changed schools... I had put up another proposal to get two more Nooks after I saw how much my kiddos loved them, but it didn't get funded before the year ended.

Now that proposal is about to expire and it isn't fully funded!

I know sometimes teachers get gift codes from Donor's Choose or can apply the monies from an unfunded project to another project... so... if you happen to have any gift codes laying around and are looking for a project to fund, please consider mine!

It expires on August 20th!

You can click the Nook pic below to check it out!

Ok.  On to Vistaprint...


I had a lot of people asking how to do custom items on Vistaprint and it is just a matter of designing them yourself, saving as a PDF, uploading, and then cropping the item.

So... here's how I did my custom "Thank You" postcards...

I designed them in Publisher:

Then went to Vistaprint and selected standard postcards and that I wanted to upload my own design:

I uploaded the file:

And then chose to crop it:

When I went to crop it, the selection box wouldn't fit right- I had to rotate it- there are two little arrows in the box that you click to rotate your image.  You can see them better in a picture below...

 

See the little dashed rectangle around my circled image?  That's the cropping box- you just pull on the corners of it to resize it and place it on the image you want uploaded.

So, now the front of my card is ready.  I would approve it and get ready to make the back by clicking to go to the back design of my card...

I put TWO images on the page I uploaded... this way I only have to pay for ONE upload, but I can crop what I need for the front of the card and the back of the card.  So, when I'm ready to do my back, I need to use a previously uploaded image...

So, I used the previously uploaded image and cropped it. but again, the image had to be rotated.  You can see the arrows better in this picture:

After that, you'd just accept the proof and go do more uploading!

This was a lot of trial and error for me at first, but now I'm pretty quick at it.  I have a file saved on my computer with some of the Vistaprint things I've made so, when I make new items, I just open the file and tweak what I had already.

Sometimes the products come and I haven't got it *quite* right... I just got a banner on which I made two banners, but they were pretty small... however, when I hung them up in my room, they actually worked quiet well!  :)

It's so fun doing Vistaprint... I hope this was a little helpful to you and your creative side!

PS- just a reminder... Back to School sale at TpT begins tomorrow!  Be sure you enter the code BTS12 at checkout to get an additional 10% off everything in my shop which will already be 20% off... for a grand total of 30% off!  I hear you can fill your cart now and check out during the sale for the discounts!

Teacher's Notebook is having huge BTS sales too... but they start TODAY over there for lots of sales... including one at my shop where everything is 20% off until the 13th!

Vistaprint... AGAIN!

Can I join my own Vistaprint linky party?  How about a support group for Vistaprint addicts?

Yesterday I made my third order... it was half off uploads and 10 free items!  I had to pay shipping... which is a bummer... but look what I made!

A few of these items are ones I forgot to share last time and, for some reason, two of the items wouldn't let me copy the preview picture, so you can't see those!

Ok- tote bag with my new school's name on it!  :)

Small poster which I'll cut apart to display directions...

Our 3rd grade team is going to call our take home folders FALCON folders since that is our school mascot.  I made these reminder postcards for kids who forget their folders at home!  I love how they turned out!

Small magnets- I'll cut these in half and do *something* with them... I hear dry erase markers will wipe off of them, so maybe something with that.  I don't know yet.

Prediction sticky notes...

Small banner... I'll cut it in half and have two banners!

LOVE this- I saw this idea originally at Queen of the Click's blog when she linked up for my Vistaprint linky party.  I used the large poster (which wasn't free, but only $9.99) and designed this template which... I hope... will be the right size!  I will write a question about our reading and students will respond by placing a sticky note with their answer on the square with their student number! 

Free t-shirt!  I paid extra to get it in gray... but this is my first official piece of apparel for my new school!  :)

I can't take credit for this idea, but I can't find who originally did it- this stamp was a freebie and a quick way to let parents know that I'm not ignoring their note or request, but just didn't have time to give it a thorough reply!

Thank you post cards!

Another banner- I already have this one at home in my possession from my first VP order... just forgot to show it to ya!

And this is probably what I'm most excited about.  I designed this game for my word work center.  It's a banner that I'll cut into three separate game boards.   Students will lay the board out and throw a bean bag, Koosh ball... don't have that part worked out quite yet... but whatever number it lands on, they will have to write that number spelling word... OR if I'm feeling particularly nice... I might let them spell it out loud to a partner and then switch and let the partner toss and spell!  I'll be keeping my eye out for other VP deals so I can *hopefully* order 4 more of these!

And there you have it!  If you haven't linked up to my linky party yet, please do!  I'd love to see what you made!

Click the pic below to head over and share your obsession creativity too!

LOADS of people have asked where I got the buntings and backgrounds I used on almost all of these files...   They all come from Lilly Bimble's Etsy shop.  Don't you *love* them?!

One last thing... last week I had an impromptu flash sale at my Teacher's Notebook shop and got a lot of sad e-mails from people who didn't know about the sale because they got their e-mail update the next morning after the sale had ended!  So... I'm going to set up another one to start tomorrow- TUESDAY- and end at midnight!  Everything will be 30% off tomorrow at Teacher's Notebook only!

Vistaprint Fever!

 **UPDATE- here's an off topic addition to this post... I'm having an impromptu FLASH SALE at Teacher's Notebook until midnight... everything is 40% off!!!*

Can I believe I just made my FIRST order of the summer last night?!  This coming from the woman who placed about 12 orders in 5 days last summer.  No joke.

So... I had a deal for lots of cheap stuff, free uploads, and free priority shipping if you spent $50.00!

And here's what I got!

This is a large car magnet that I put these signs on- I have already made these on cardstock and put magnets on the back of them, but they aren't sticking well... so I'll just cut this in fourths!

This one is the oversized postcard- front and back.  I will just cut them in half so kids can check out books from my library!

Here are some small magnets I will give out at open house for kids to display their good work on the fridge at home!

This is the small poster.  I put my classroom rules on it and now see that I left out an exclamation point... so I guess I'll be drawing one on when the items arrive.  On well!

Next up is the rack card.  I have made mine for silent and partner reading...

Sticky notes for kids to hang up when they are invited to "Lunch Bunch" on Friday...

And cards for kids to write out "Bucket Fillers" for each other- the backs are blank so they can write a message to their friend and then put it in our "Bucket Filler" pocket charts...

I also got some address labels for me and the hubs and a pad of boring sticky notes because they were the free ones.

Here's the greatest reveal... a screenshot of what I spent and what I saved.  Are you ready for this?  It's pretty awesome!

Love it!  Have you Vista Printed yet?  Did you blog about it?  Please remember to follow "Linky Party etiquette" and link back to this post if you join my linky party!  You can also click HERE to purchase a Groupon for $20.00 to get $80.00 worth of stuff!  Thanks to Kristen Kimbell for leaving me a comment about that.  I just bought one!  :)

Vistaprint... It begins!

I was just thinking about doing a linky party about this when I saw that Spolight on Kindergarten is currently hosting a Vistaprint linky party! Head over and sign up for the fun!

I've done really well staying away from Vistaprint this summer... but that is officially over. I've made two orders in the past two days! But, with this coupon which gives a ton of free items AND free 7-day shipping when you spend $30.00, how can I NOT order stuff?! I know the coupon says it is expired but... shhhhh!... it isn't!

So, I wanted to share what I've ordered for next year. Can I add a "so far" in there?

Sticky notes for denoting "tricky words"

A cute thank you card!

A stamp for making writing grading easy!

Another cute "thank you"

Just a fun teacher notepad

Car magnet

A sticky note pad for questioning

One of my favorite quotes on a pen!

Yard sign to hang above my "soon-to-be" partner reading table!

Mouse pad

Sticky note pad for kids to write their names on and hang on the "lunch bunch" poster

Predictions sticky note pad

Stickers... too cute!

Banner to hang up when the leaves start rolling in for the exchange we're in!

One of my goals this year is to be more vigilant in making sure library books are returned in a timely manner... hopefully this sticky note pad will help!

Another "just plain cute" notepad for meeeee!

Poster for "Lunch Bunch"

Car magnet to hang near clip chart

Super cute new clip chart "happy note" for my kiddos! The color side is the front and the black and white is the back.

Connections sticky notes

Two different bookmarks- both on business cards

So cute! I plan to put these on students' homework sheets on the day their book orders arrive! :)

A banner to hang up and then put a sticky note with students' names when they reach levels in my 100 Club!

These are the check out cards for my class library- on the large postcards... then I cut them in half to get double the cards!

So, there they are... the first two VP orders of the summer! Can't wait to get my stuff!