Awkward Meeting, Pinterest Style

Awkward encounter with 7th grade student at the Y:

'Billy': {gasp!} Mrs. C! What are YOU doing here??!!

Me: {recalling recent Pinterest giggle} Oh, you know, hunting elephants. What are you doing here?

'Billy': {after brief moment of confusion} I, too, am hunting elephants.

Impressive recovery and response for a 13 year old.

Fabric Storage

Here's another Pinterest theft that - not kidding - has been life-changing. Okay, that's a bit dramatic; let's say uber life-enhancing.

Here's the Pinterest photo:

Admire the beauty of fabrics all folded the exact same size? The answer? Comic book boards!!!

This pack of 100 cost me less than $12 on Amazon (with free shipping, of course), and completely transformed my fabric storage world. They are 6 3/4" x 10", and are perfect for creating mini bolts of fabric!

The teacher before me left a very generous amount of fabric, but it was all piled into an enormous box that came all the way up to my chest, not kidding. Without time to unpack this GI-NORMOUS box I had no access to any of it other than what was at the very top. I finally got around to emptying the box onto some shelving, but even with folding it was still pretty unruly. Enter the comic book boards.

Again, how I wish I'd taken more before and after shots (you really should have seen The Box!), but I was so excited once I started I just couldn't stop folding!

And now you know one of my secret shames {blush}. 

Dice!

Here's a fantastic idea that I totally stole from Pinterest!

AMAZING! Keeps dice from rolling everywhere, or getting lost, or being thrown at someone's head... you get the idea. 

File Cabinet Upgrade

Like so many teachers, I have some pretty hideous file cabinets - one in particular is especially cringe-worthy. While it has been on my list all year to work on this issue, there are obviously a lot of other things that were much more important to take care of first. However, last week I just couldn't take it anymore!!! So I dealt with the most hideous one. Sadly I didn't take a pure before photo, but did think to take one about halfway through (and next to it is a mostly-obscured photo of it I took last May upon my first visit to the classroom):

 

Gah! Told you it was hideous! There are of course about 79 different ways to updo your file cabinets currently dancing around Pinterest, here's how I did mine. Note: I only had the time to cover the drawers, didn't touch the rest of it. If I were making over the entire thing at the same time, I would take the drawers out, which would make it much easier.

MATERIALS:

Gift wrap, clear contact paper, shipping tape, screwdriver, bucket, dishrag, Dawn dish soap

1. Removed all hardware from drawer.

2. Scrubbed down front and back of face, sides, and underneath front of drawer with dish water; let dry.

3. Cut out rectangle of gift wrap slightly larger than front of drawer:

4. Marked where drawer handle screws should go:

5. Cut out a piece of clear contact paper about an inch longer than gift wrap on all sides, taped it upside down to a table:

6. Removed paper backing, centered gift wrap with design down on sticky side, cut out corners of contact paper:

7. Applied to front of drawer, pulling lengthwise until tight and securing edges with tape:

8. Cut slits in contact paper where necessary to attach, taped down the rest of the sides:

9. Folded in corners of top and bottom, then folded over top and bottom edges and taped:

10. Placed clear hole reinforcers around the dots where the screws belong:

 

11. Poked through the holes, reattached handles. The end!

Obviously I did it the quick and sloppy way, but I had it done within two days and it has made a HUGE difference. Eventually I will repaint the outside of the cabinet and the handles as well, but this will do for now.

And yes, I do plan to do something about all of the ridiculous stencils on the wall! Summer is six weeks away...

Envelopes!

Oh Pinterest, you saucy minx, always giving me obvious ideas that I should've come up with years ago. Today I wrote out another round of teacher prayer cards, but this time I made my own envelopes! Here's the original pin, and here's how I did it:

Found this cute pack of cardstock at Michael's (half off! Didn't even have to use the standby 40& off coupon!):

Opened up a regular envelope the same size I wanted to make:

Traced the envelope onto the cardstock and cut:

Folded 'em up (I used a ruler to help make a sharper crease, didn't take a pic), and used double-sided tape to hold the flaps:

Ta-da! Created this stack in the time it took to watch "The Office" on the DVR! 

I wrote the addresses on labels and then slapped them on - worked great! I may never use a "real" envelope again! : )

Zip Ties, Desks, and Sanity

Back at the beginning of the school year, the only student seating I had were very large, very heavy tables. Here's a photo from the beginning of June, two and a half months before I could go in and do any work in the room:

I hated these tables. Having a full classroom of kids facing four different ways did not work for me, but there was no way to arrange them to avoid that. And then I realized that I had soooo many sewing tables jammed into storage areas.

This got me to thinking...

Now I could see what EVERYONE was doing. Of course, the kids kept opening the tables and messing with the machines, so over Christmas Break...

I removed the sewing machines and wonderful hubby drilled the tables shut. That problem was solved!

At the beginning of the new semester, I decided to try another arrangement:

Love it! The only problem with these "desks" is that five minutes into each class they tend to look like this:

So frustrating! (Credit for the idea of using happy faces for confidentiality purposes goes to The (Un)Caffeinated Teacher) Even more frustrating were the kids who insisted they "couldn't help it" that their desks moved two to three feet every time they were in class.

A couple of months ago I found this idea on Pinterest from an elementary school teacher:

So genius! Yet, my desks don't have legs, so I wasn't able to use it. D'oh!!!

Then on Friday I happened to be looking at the floor (probably because of a mess left by someone), and noticed that there are spaces right above the wheels on my desks, and sooooo....

I gleefully installed these on Saturday morning, then waited giddily today to see how they worked. It was AMAZING - no desk drift whatsoever! A photo right after last bell:

Also enjoyable was how the kids who "accidentally" moved their desks before reacted - haha! 

So anyway, all this to say 1) Zip ties ROCK!, 2) Zip ties SAVE sanity!, and 3) If at first a truly inspiring idea from Pinterest seems like it won't work, don't give up on it - find a way! It's always worth it!