Simple Sewing Projects

Today I installed my simple sewing projects in my classroom. Neither project was earth-shatteringly awesome or original, I just needed them to cover up some ugly spaces.

The first one was a fabric panel that needed to be hemmed to cover up the back of my now-exposed bookshelf. I rearranged my teacher's desk area to now include the bookshelf of teaching books I have. I don't have space in a closet or cabinet for these, and I certainly don't have space at home. Before they were facing away from my desk, and I had to get up and walk around the corner of my desk every time I needed a book. I also wanted to cut off student access to that side of my desk. Now they have to come around to the other side...at least they will in theory...somehow they always find a way to get to that side of my desk.

I had this fabric leftover from my old dorm room curtains that one of my roommates in college left behind when she went to student-teach. I don't love the fabric, but I hate spending money on something like this. So I just worked with what I had. I did buy some Scotch brand sticky Velcro squares for about $3.67 at Wal-Mart. I affixed these to both the bookshelf and the fabric. I had purchased them for the other sewing project, and thought it would be an easy way to stick the fabric to the bookshelf and still prevent the bookshelf from being permanently altered. I don't really like these little squares because almost all of the sticky comes off the back when you peel it from the plastic packaging. You have to really show it who's boss if you want all the sticky to come off with the Velcro. I probably would avoid buying this brand again.

It's full of imperfections, but I'm a lazy perfectionist and really don't care. I'm also putting a reading chair in front of this to hide some of the imperfections. Here it is:

The second project I just hemmed a skinny panel of fabric to wrap around the computer cords that were now exposed after I moved the bookshelf.

Here's how they looked before:

Once I got back to school, I wrapped the fabric around the cords in a tube-like fashion and then placed the sticky Velcro squares where I thought they would work best to keep the fabric in place. My goal was to make this stay closed without complicated sewing or button-hole making.

Here's how it looks afterwards:

My husband said it's a little lame (after I asked him for his honest opinion), and I sort of agree. It did fulfill my expectations, though, and will work for now. I kind of hate cords. The cords at my desk have been making me crazy for the past few years, but unless I put my desk with my back to the kids, it won't work any other way. So, I will deal with it in the meantime.




I guess there is really no main point to this post. I'm just showing you that projects don't have to be perfect or dazzling or life-changing or Pinterest-worthy complete with caption reading "50 Teaching Life Hacks. Mind=blown" or some other hackneyed Pinterest comment. Sometimes we just have to make do with what we have and focus on the important aspects of teaching...like the reading curriculum binder that is currently shouting my name. Better get working on that...sigh.

Monday Made It

 

Phew! What a day...I'm seriously out of practice in being busy outside of the house. I was gone for like a grand total of seven or eight hours today and feel like it was fifteen hours away from home. PATHETIC! I better get used to it when school comes around again. Those are some loooong days!

I spent the bulk of my time in my classroom rearranging, making to-do lists, chatting on the phone with a co-worker who was in the same building, weeding out junk, organizing, etc. It was fun. I really don't have a ton of work in my classroom that I HAVE to do before Orientation night which is two weeks from tomorrow. I do have a ton of planning that I want to get done before I get distracted by putsing around in my room.

The things I made today took little to no effort. We're on a tight budget right now as we pay off debt the Dave Ramsey way, so I didn't really have any money at the moment to go out and buy craft supplies.

Here's what I made:

Digital Paper from: Graphics by The Hazel Owl @ http://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Store/The-Hazel-Owl”

I got this idea from this post . I think I saw it somewhere else too, but I can't remember where. I took it to our school's print shop to get laminated and plan to hang it on the bulletin board behind my desk once it's laminated. I'm then planning to fill in the blanks using wet-erase markers every time I start a new book. I'm hoping it keeps me accountable to read more during the school year. There's always one student who will pester you if you don't update something like this.

I also downloaded this freebie from TpT to replace my very sorry-looking behavior clip chart that I had made a few years ago. It was getting super faded and needed an upgrade. So I printed it out, trimmed it to size, glued it together, and took it to our print shop to be laminated. I couldn't decide whether or not to do this with card stock. I didn't have any at home where I printed it, and I didn't want to mess with putting a sturdier back on it. We'll see how it holds up. I can always buy some card stock and reprint later.

Here's a look at the sorry state of my faded original clip chart:

Here's the new one glued together (ignore the un-vacuumed carpet):

Chart from : Free to Teach

I just realized this new chart is smaller than my old chart. Oops. I think I like it that way though. I might be more consistent in using it. Does anyone else have a hard time consistently using their behavior management system? The nice thing about this freebie is it also came with some masters for documenting behavior for Parent Contact. I think I will use them and staple them to their assignment notebooks.

This last thing is what I made for Sunday dinner yesterday. Sooooooo good! It has kind of funky ingredients (as in you wouldn't normally put these things together), but it was super easy. Best of all, it was a crockpot meal. I do a crockpot meal almost every Sunday because we are usually at church for 4-5 hours on a Sunday morning and are FAMISHED when we get home. Plus, my hubby usually has to get to work pretty soon after we get home, so crockpot is the way to go!

Slow Cooker Maple Mustard Chicken

Click here for the link to the recipe.

So, it was a very productive day. I'm beat though. Phew. Tomorrow, I'm hoping to show you some of the anchor charts I saved from last year. Thanks for stopping by!