OK to Wake Alarm Clock

We finally got our "Ok to Wake! Alarm Clock" from Amazon. I love ordering from Amazon! They have always offered great customer service and they offer all sorts of things! This time we did have a little hiccup. My box came in on Friday. I was so excited because we had the weekend to try it out and get her used to it. When I opened the box, there were two jars of hair pomade! Did you even know they still made that stuff??? So I immediately went online and ordered a return label. Amazon said they would go ahead and send my replacement and it came today and it really couldn't have came at a better time! Here is an update from my previous post (you can see it here).

Sophie has been doing great! She has slept in her bed all night since we started her chart. We cheated this past Friday and gave her a treat early after five days instead of six, but she has continued to do well and I am so proud of her! Below is her chart with her smiley faces! This Wednesday is her next prize day! Sophie is proud of herself too. She even said the other day on the way home that she had to stay in her bed so she could get a smiley face on her chart. I reinforced her and told her she was right! She is working so hard!

:)

Now, we are to the reason I am so glad the clock came in today. Sunday, Sophie woke us up calling from her bedroom asking if she could get up. I told her no that it wasn't time yet. She waited an hour and hollered again. I told her she could come in. I just knew it was going to happen that she would start waking up and asking to come out of her room, thus my reasoning for ordering the clock. The same thing happened this morning with her waking a little before five.Thank goodness the clock came in today. Here are some pictures of it.

It came with two face plates. One is the daisy shown and the other is supposed to make it look like a bug.

It has a night light mode that stays on for two hours and then goes off. The clock runs on batteries so it has different power saving tricks. I didn't use this feature because she already has a nightlight.

When it is time to wake up it turns green and the animation changes on the clock to a face and its eyes move. It is pretty neat. 

The controls are concealed in the back. A toddler could get into it. So we have her clock on a high shelf, but she picked where it is so she can easily see it from her bed.

I showed her what color the clock turns and how that means she can get out of bed. I let her pick the spot that it went and she is so proud of it! She even asked me why I was taking pictures of her clock. I will update this post with how it works. I am not expecting an overnight miracle, but I hope it at least is a reminder for her to stay in bed and not yell to us about getting up. 

***Update***
The clock has worked great so far! Sophie stays in the bed until it turns green. We have one time of her climbing in the bed with us since all of this started and I am not sure she was completely awake when that happened. We did have to replace the batteries in it already but that was because I used whatever I could find in the house to put in it. We put brand new batteries in it and I am hoping it will last longer this time. I do wish it had the option to plug in. Sophie loves the night light feature on it which I am sure is part of the reason the batteries died, but it doesn't stay on all night. I think it goes off after an hour. I still recommend this clock! We have really enjoyed it!

Toddler Growing Pains!

Sophie can sense there is a change coming! She is acting out more, wanting me to hold her in my lap, and needing attention (good or bad). It has been rough!

One thing that had gotten really bad was Sophie's nightly visits to our bedroom. Sophie always goes to bed in her bed and very rarely fights us on it, but the sleepovers were getting bad! We are talking about coming in at 2:00 and us putting her back in bed at 3:00 and then being back in our room at 4:30 or 5:00 at which point we would just let her stay because we were getting up soon. We would tell her over and over that she needed to stay in her bed at night and that she was a big girl. We talked about when Maggie gets here she is going to have to be quiet and that Maggie may be in our room because she is a baby and we can't wake her. We tried every angle and nothing worked.

It came to a head this past Sunday. Sophie came in our room at her usual 2:00 and Klint put her back in bed at 3:30. We went back to sleep. She came back in our room between 5:30 and 6:00 (I was half asleep so I really don't remember.) She decided she wanted to sleep on top of my pregnancy pillow (Side note: This is the best pregnancy pillow ever!!! I highly recommend.) Well, she kept rolling off on top of me or on top of Klint. It was awful! Then, Klint tried to roll over and get away from her and banged his arm on the night stand. He just got up and went to the couch at that point. Sophie went and asked him why he left and he told her she needed to stay in her own bed. She came back and asked me if what he said was true and I told her yes. I repeated again everything I have said to her a million times. She told me okay and went back to sleep in Klint's empty spot. I knew that we hadn't gotten through. Well, because we had hardly any sleep the night before, we were really late for church. Another turning point for us in this battle...it was starting to interfere with everything.

Sophie likes to count down things and she really needs something she can physically see. So I made a chart to help her track her nights in the bed. I showed her the chart and explained that every night she stayed in bed she would get a smiley face on her chart. We explained again how she had to stay in bed all night and she could get up when we called her. She agreed and we hung it on the fridge. She has to make it six days in a week to earn a surprise (A movie from the $5 at Wal-Mart). Below is the chart.

Sunday night: Was rough! Sophie did stay in bed all night, but she had me up all night! At 1:00 she needed another kiss and a hug (as tired as I was, how could I deny her that?) and then at 3:30 she woke me up to tell me she needed to go potty. The next morning we told her we were so proud she stayed in her bed and didn't get in bed with us, but she didn't have to wake mommy and daddy to go to the potty. We told her she had a night light in the bathroom and she was a big girl and big girls go all on their own! She did get a smiley face.

Monday night: No Sophie in the bed! Woo hoo! Another smiley face and she didn't wake me or her daddy up for anything.

A friend, Jessica, suggested I order her an alarm clock that tells her when it is time to get up. I ordered it Sunday because I wasn't sure just the chart would work (in fact I am still a little skeptical it will continue to work.) and I thought I don't want her to yell to ask if she can get up when we have a sleeping baby in the house. This clock is really neat. You set the time and when it is that time, the clock turns green letting them know they can get up. I thought it was a very neat concept and one that would be easy to teach her. She is also interested in time right now so we can maybe start teaching her time with this clock. I'll update once it comes in on how it works.

So, two nights in and we are doing good so far. We reminded her again tonight about her chart and I hope that inspires her to stay in bed. Wish us luck!

Look at that face!!! So sweet! (And no, she did not wear this in public!)

Teacher Projects: Meeting Binder and Lesson Planner

Wow! I have missed blogging! It has been a couple of weeks and school is in full swing. Now that we have our routine back down, I will try to post more often.

I shared my Pinterest teacher projects in my post here. You can go back and see what I made. Honestly my favorite thing from the whole post is the To Do Frame. I used it everyday! It keeps me straight and make sure things that need to be done stay on my radar!


Another idea I saw on Pinterest was making a Binder for everything important. I decided to do this for my meetings that I attend through the school year. Normally I just use a regular notebook and it is so unorganized. I couldn't keep my notes straight. I couldn't find something I had written down from a previous meeting...it was horrible. So I decided to make a binder for all my meetings and after setting it up, I realize I go to a lot of meetings! Here is my notebook.

I put a copy of my roster in the front to have easy access when meeting with teachers or in case of a drill.

 I keep my calendar in the pocket so it is always with me and in easy reach.

 

My first section has all of my schedules. I have my personal schedule, my meeting schedules, and the district calendar.

I just hole punch my notes and put them where they go. So easy and organized!

All of my tabs! I go to a lot of meetings as I said before!

My lesson planner is something I started last year. I have to plan for three grades and I really didn't want to take home four different binders and other materials home to plan. I also didn't want to have a ton of stuff spread all over my desk. So, I put it all in one notebook and I love it! It is easy and compact and absolutely wonderful! (Can you tell I love it?) Here it is!

:)

My first section is my personal schedule and my roster of students. In the pocket I keep the rosters for my classes and any other information I might need.

The next section has my lesson plans. (Once again, an old lesson plan)

I divide the rest of my notebook for my grades. This is where I put my CCGPS. Our school district sends home what standards we will cover by nine weeks. These haven't came out yet, but when they do, I will add them to this section.

I also printed these posters to use too. I put them in my lesson plan book, but I may move them if they start taking up too much room. I got these here. (Thanks, DeeAnn for sharing the link!) They are free. You add them to your cart and then they email you the link to download them. So easy!

There you have it. My super organized binders. I hope I can keep it up for the rest of the year. I just love my binders!

Baby Kelly Update: The Big Reveal!

We went to the doctor today for my 16 weeks checkup and to take a peek at the baby to see if we could tell what he or she is...kind of getting old referring to the baby as "it"!

The doctor told us that all of my bloodwork for possible genetic problems came back fine and showed no problems. She said I was measuring right on and the heart beat was good. We asked her a few questions about traveling and I asked about getting the pertussis vaccination while I was pregnant. This was something my mom was horrified about and we heard a report that it is at an all time high for this year. She said I could get it after 20 weeks or I could wait and they would do it in the hospital. I want to go ahead a get it. I don't want to take any chances.

So she sent us to take our peek. We were so excited and Sophie was ready to see the baby. Here are a few pictures.

We were able to find out what we were having! She was about 85% sure. Here is what we found out!

As for the name, it will not be Kelly. Her name will be Margaret "Maggie" June. Margaret was Klint's grandmother's name and June is my mom and grandmother's middle name. We are so excited and can't wait to welcome Maggie! Keep praying for us!