Primary Essentials: 10 Things About Me

I've only been blogging for a short amount of time. I'm finding it harder than I thought it would be to gain followers and crave out time to blog on a weekly basis. I'm going to do my very best to do better going forward! I did share a few things about myself on my very first blog post, but I thought maybe I should share a few more! So here goes everything...

1. I have three kids. I have a son that is 17 years old and a senior in high school. Time has flown by and I find it very hard to believe that he is really a SENIOR. I have two girls. My oldest daughter is 11 years old and a 6th grader. My youngest daughter is 9 years old and a 4th grader. They are the center of my life. I can not imagine my life without them! Being a single mom is not always easy or fun, but I know that everything I do is to benefit them.

Picture taken by RC Photography

Aren't they all kinds of cute???!!!? I told them this picture of them should be a stock photo in picture frames being sold in stores!

2. This is my 15th year working in education. Yep, I said 15. I taught Second grade for 9 years. I absolutely LOVED teaching Second grade with a passion. You might be thinking that if I loved teaching 2nd so much why would I leave. I decided I wanted to try something different for a while. I was a Primary ELA/Social Studies Instructional Support Teacher working with Pre K-2 for 5 years. My role as an IST was to work mostly with teachers Monday thru Thursday. On Fridays, I wrote curriculum for the district. I also presented district wide staff development a couple of times each year. This year my title is still the same although the job has changed drastically. I now work with Tier 1 & 2 students in grades K-5 for Reading and Math to help them fill learning gaps. Even after fifteen years, I feel as though there is so much to learn about best practices and new ideas. I just love to learn and try new things.

3. Both my parents are deceased. My mom passed away in 1980. My grandmother graciously stepped up to help my dad raise my sister and me. My dad passed away in 2001. And recently (this year) my grandmother passed away. I can say that it has been hard to not have a parental figure in my life. I totally know that I'm an adult, but it's always nice to have parents or a parental figure to talk with about the things going on in your life.

4. My sister is a very important part of my life. We try to make a point to talk to each other everyday and see each other at least once a week. She is my rock! She's probably the only person that can talk me down from the ledge of being overstressed or dramatic about things that are going on in my life. She is such a strong individual. She suffers from Prolonged QT Syndrome and Congestive Heart Failure. She is totally pacemaker dependent. None of that stops her from living her life. If you ever met her, you would more than likely not even know that she has health issues! She has a blog too. You can check out her blog with every beat love fran.

I use to send this YouTube video to my sister randomly and tell her this is how I feel about her. I wonder if she remembers this!

5. I LOVE, LOVE, LOVE...good, colorful pens, bags of all kinds, cute brightly colored scrapbook paper, making things look cute, hot pink, hot chocolate, sour chewy candy, and baking cakes and cookies from scratch.

6. I dislike cinnamon, early mornings, having to bring out the MEAN mom side of me, being in a room full of people I do not know, wearing heels, scary movies, and spending long periods of time outside in hot or cold weather!

7. A few odd things about me...I HATE to shop! I know that's unusual. Anytime I have to go shopping I look up what I need online and check to see if it's available in the store before I go. I do a lot of online shopping, but even that is boring to me. I do not use an alarm clock. I naturally wake up at 5:30 a.m. I have overslept a few times here and there, but for the most part I'm up on time each morning. I like most chocolate candy, but do not like chocolate cake or ice cream. In my head I am really crafty, but when I try to make things a reality they usually do not turn out like my vision.

8. My all time favorite movie is Annie the 1982 version. I know all the words and songs. My kids do not ever want to watch it with me! Some of my other favs are A Little Princess the 1995 version, Love & Basketball, Love Jones, Two Weeks Notice, Notting Hill, The Best Man and The Best Man Holiday. I just recently got on the Hunger Games train. I generally like any movie that Sandra Bullock, Julia Roberts, Nia Long, Will Smith, and Sanaa Lathan star in.

9. I love to read although I'm ashamed to say that I have not read a book from cover to cover in a while. My favorite author is Kimberla Lawson Roby. The first book from her collection that I read was One in a Million. I seriously love her series on the Revered Curtis Black. It is a must read!

10. I started selling products on Teachers Pay Teachers one year and eight months ago. My main reason for opening a store on TPT was to make extra money for my family so that I could do some fun things with my kids. In the first year, I really only made enough to put money on their lunch accounts for extra things like ice cream and chips once or twice a week. They were so happy about that. I'm thrilled that as time has gone on I have gained more and more TPT followers and sells have started to pick up. I'm truly excited about what the future holds for me on TPT! As my son graduates from high school and heads to college, my prayer is that I will be able use the money to help him pay for expenses. Feel free to hop on over to Primary Essentials on TPT and look around. While you are there become a follower!