The most important dress!

The frugal girls went shopping in a BIG way yesterday! Let me give you a hint... the maids took our beautiful bride-to-be, Brittany to pick out the most important dress she will ever wear! Okay, so it was more like a *total giveaway* than a little "hint"! I've never been very subtle anyway! There is no reason to start now!

So as you can imagine, we wanted to bring gown shopping to a whole new level! Being Brittany's maid-of-honor is a job I don't take lightly! I wanted her dress shopping day to be everything she had hoped for! Living in a rural city like Ocala means there are not many absolutely no places to shop! We're talking very slim pickings here! So we planned to take MLK day (No school!) to head south bound and dress shop Orlando-style to find the perfect dress!

A message to Brittany from here bridesmaids! We filled the basket with celebratory pink champagne labeled "Brittany's Bridal Bubbly!"

Yum! 

We had a "Bridal Brunch" before we hit the road. The Bridal Gown Itinerary was set on all the plates so everyone knew the schedule for the day! We followed it almost perfectly, I might add! Dinner was going to be at Cheesecake Factory at 6:00 so we made sure to eat enough brunch to hold us over all day! Plus, we bought tons of snacks for the car ride.

Our bride! She's sipping mimosa's and reading a letter from her closest friends! 

Cheers to our bride!!! 

Lots of pink!

 Table view!

The bride, her bridesmaids and her sweet flower girl, Madison!
 We are only missing one of the bridesmaids. She had to work :(
We are all enjoying our healthy brunch.
"Do you think champagne makes you bloated" quoted from our bride! Too funny! The answer must be no because she looked perfect in all of her dresses!

Each girl also got a bottle of lotion called "Diamond Dust." It said, "she has her man, she has her maids, she has her diamond... now all she needs is her DRESS!!"

It was such a perfect day! Let me tell you, Matt is one lucky guy! Brittany looked absolutely STUNNING in every single dress she tried on! She narrowed her search down to the final three!!! We need to bring Brittany's mom back with us to help with the final decision! I'm pretty confident that Brittany will say YES to the DRESS very soon!!!!

The dress will have to remain a surprise for the big day, October 20, 2013!

Stay tuned... 

Tic-tac-toe addition

Let's be honest... math can be a real doozie sometimes! Brittany and I were no math maniacs growing up. Britt still thinks math is probably the most boring part of the day. However, I find math to be pretty GOSH DARN AMAZING!  I mean, it's so hands-on and just plain BETTER than it was when I was growing up! LOVE IT! Brittany loves reading and writing. I can totally understand why. She's an incredible teacher and her writing and reading instruction is life-changing! I just love watching her in action! She's taught me so much and it's made me a much better teacher. I guess that's why we make such a great team! Math is totally my thing! I just love the path that math instruction has taken over the last few years. My first graders love it too! Here is a math activity we did together with partners.  A little old fashioned tic-tac-toe "addition style"!! Enjoy!!
                  Tic-Tac-Toe Addition

Missing addend freebie

The frugal girls are busy setting up Brittany's Smart board so we only have time for a quick freebie tonight. Hope everyone has an easier time with missing addends. That is one hard concept for little ones to understand.

Missing Addend Freebie

Bring on the technology!!!

Hi friends! We don't know about you, but our classrooms have been SUPER busy these last few days. Coming back from winter break is usually a fun time in first grade because they come back a little more grown up and it always appears to be a little more calm in class. However, 2013 has started a little chaotic and overwhelming. We decided to relieve our stress this past weekend with a fabulous and oh-so-frugal shopping trip!

Check out Brittany's cart! 

There were some fabulous deals to be found! $2.53 for these adorable sandals from Kohl's!  Shout out to one of our coworkers over in 2nd grade for sharing this total steal with us!!! Thanks Rachel! 

 As you all know, shopping is one of our favorite things to do. We are always excited when we manage to find an awesome bargain. But at this moment, we have even bigger news! Even better than any discount... Are you ready for this???

Cue Fireworks please!!!

Tomorrow Brittany is getting her very own SMART Board!!!!

On that note! Tomorrow our classes will all be hanging out in the same classroom while this gem is being installed! We are in the middle of an author study on the talented, Jan Brett! Don't worry, we plan to blog about it when we're done!

Please feel free to download this quick, little "Long Vowel Challenge." We are finishing up long i and are still working on "flipping the sound."

Long I Vowel Challenge

Also, below you will find the same activity for long a words. It served as a nice review for our firsties!

Long A Vowel Challenge

We are happy to report that when we write our next post we'll both have SMART boards! Hooray!!!

Science Fair

The dreaded, REQUIRED, annual Science Fair project is due on Thursday. Our first graders LOVE LOVE LOVE Science, and we think it's pretty awesome too! However, something about the word required makes it not-so-fun for teachers. In k-2 at our school the class does a project together. This year we asked the question, "Which liquid stains teeth the most?" We are using hard boiled eggs (the shell is made of calcium, very similar to our tooth enamel) and a few of our favorite sugary drinks to find our results.

Before we went too far into what our project was all about, we decided to tackle the SCIENTIFIC METHOD with our firsties. We created an anchor chart together to explain the steps scientists use.

We suggest incorporating a lot of WHOLE BRAIN teaching when explaining these steps to your students. Fancy words like HYPOTHESIS can be very tricky for first graders to say, let alone understand. Trust us, the more whole brain learning... the better. 

Today we wrote out our question: "Which liquid stains teeth the most?"

Next we wrote down our Hypothesis. Most students think coffee will stain teeth the most. Even our student's were saying, "Oh no! Ms. Peterson and Ms. Prussing are in trouble. They love coffee"

We put one egg into each of the four liquids (coffee, grape juice, sweet tea and Root Beer). The eggs are going to soak in the liquids for the next few days. Tomorrow we plan on making observations and recording our data from day 1 and day 2. 

More Science Fair fun to come!

Linus and Gus Sign Sort

Hi Friends! Just wanted to share another fun freebie to use when teaching your student's about Linus and Gus the math brother signs! Click on the link below to download for free!

Linus and Gus Math Sort

A year in review...

What a year it has been!  2012 left the frugal girls with some AMAZING memories!  Looking back on all that we have accomplished this year definitely brings a BIG smile to our faces!  Starting our blog definitely made it in the top five on our list of things to do in 2012... and look where we are today!!!  We are SUPER excited to see what 2013 has in store for us!  Here's a quick look back at some of our FAV memories from 2012...  

 This is a Melissa and I ringing in 2012... exactly one year ago!  My oh my, time sure does fly!

Later that same night, as the ball was dropping, Matt popped the big question and of course I said YES!  Well... actually, the first words out of my mouth were "what are you doing..." hahaha 

Truth be told,  I thought he fell or was fooling around, I totally was not expecting him to go down on one knee and propose!  We were officially engaged during the first minute of 2012!   

Our fabulous coworkers nominated us for the 2011-2012 Teacher of the Year (Brittany) and Rookie of the Year (Melissa) so we were able to attend the Gala together. Plus we got parking spots side by side, SCORE!!!

SPRING BREAK 2012!  Melissa and I decided to get a jump on wedding planning and ventured off to St. Augustine to check out some venues and of course hit the beach... after all, isn't that what spring break is all about!  We just HAD to snap a pic as we passed by the oldest wooden school house in the U.S.A. - how adorable!

 

Spring break should be longer than just one week.... there's absolutely no way to fit it all in!  And believe me, we had an agenda!  This was Melissa and I on one of our many trips to the beach... post spring break!  The weather was PERFECT!

Then we celebrated the end of a great school year with a trip to CANCUN!!!

This guy would fit perfectly with my classroom theme... FROGS!



 FOURTH OF JULY!  Melissa and I decided to go ALL OUT!  She picked up these snazzy party favors on sale at TARGET!  I ADORE THIS PIC!

We continued to celebrate our nation's independence by grubbing out on this delicious FEAST!  Our good friends hosted a seafood boil fit for a king... or more suitably, a QUEEN! 

 It was DEE-LISH-US!  Can't wait to do it again next year! We all decided to make it a 4th of July tradition... YUM!

Oh and how could we forget... MY 30TH BIRTHDAY!  Ugh, the dreaded dirty 30, it sounds so OLD! (sad face) To be honest, I really wasn't looking forward to my birthday this year.  I wanted to hold on to my 20ies just a little bit longer!  haha Melissa and Kelly really know how to make a girl feel special!  Love them!  SIDE NOTE: This turned out to be the HOTTEST day ever!  We managed to snap a few cute pics before we were dripping in sweat!

Since I down in the dumps about turning into an old woman, Matt decided to get a bounce house for me!  WE HAD A FREAKIN BLAST!  Oh to be a kid again!   It was the perfect gift to make me feel young again! 

We continued the birthday festivities a couple weeks later with Melissa's 27th birthday on October 1st!  We went for dinner at one of our FAV restaurants, HARRY'S!  They have the absolute best mussels we've ever had and the pecan crusted trout is A-MAZ-ING!  It makes me hungry just thinking about it! Mmm...mmm

OH YES WE DID!!! haha Miss Nelson and Viola Swamp made their annual appearance in our classrooms for our Literacy Celebration this year (our version of BOOK-O-WEEN).  You should have seen our firsties faces! PRICELESS!  Melissa and I have been doing this bit for 3 years now and we've got it down to a science.  She starts off dressed as Miss Nelson and reads both of our classes the childrens' classic we all know and love, Miss Nelson is Missing.  I pretend I have a meeting to go to and scurry off to transform myself into Viola Swamp.  At the end of the story, Melissa pretends that the kids are being rude and acting up (just like in the story) and she's had enough, so she runs out.  And that, my friends, is when I make my grand entrance!!!  I read the sequel to the first story, Miss Nelson Comes Back and teach our little ones to respect their lovely teachers!  Our next step is to take it to Broadway!  hahaha

In November, our good friend Jessica welcomed sweet baby Kennedy into the world!  Here she is with her fabulous sister Chey who threw her an absolutely adorable baby shower!  SO PRECIOUS!  No babies for the frugal girls until after our weddings!  We are sweatin' for the dress! 

We also found a hidden gem here in Ocala this year called "A Cut Above"... its a fabulous little boutique where we happened to stumble upon some even more fabulous deals in our many shopping trips there.  The owner (also named Brittany) hand picks some of the cutest dresses we've ever seen!  We L-O-V-E it!  It's a definite stop when we are perusing through town! Check out A Cut Above's website! They deliver and they blog!! It's a win-win!

MERRY GRINCHMAS! We picked up these adorable shirts to go along with our Grinch themed day!  We'll have to go back and take pics of all our adorable anchor charts and activities that we made.  Most of our ideas were inspired by things we've seen on some of our fav teaching blogs!  Who doesn't love the GRINCH!!! SO fun!

And of course, THE GRANDE FINALE!  Melissa and Rob got ENGAGED! I'm SO SO SO happy for them both!  Matt and I were so excited we got to be there for this oh-so-special moment!   

And there you have it frugal followers... this was only a glimpse at some of the happenings of 2012!  It truly was a great year and we are hoping to top it in 2013!  Lucky number 13, right?!  Melissa and I had a blast this past year and are so very excited that our blog is up and running so we can connect with all you fabulous people!  We love blogging about our lives as teachers and as friends and all the stuff in between!  We will keep you posted with what we're working on in our classrooms, our frugal shopping finds, and, of course, our wedding planning!  After all, we now have TWO  weddings to plan and we couldn't be more excited!  (thank God for PINTEREST)  Wishing all our frugal followers and their families and HAPPY NEW YEAR, may this be your BEST year YET!