March At-A-Glance

90/365 Roses are... White

Davy put the "big bad blue box" in the mail today and celebrated by bringing me roses. I really am a lucky lady.

89/365 Our New Pets

88/365

87/365

Part of yesterday's ECU Youth Arts Fest included demos from local artists. This shot shows how raw felt can be worked together to make beautiful patterns. They reminded me of geodes that held beautiful minerals. The artist let the boys select a variety of colors of raw felt, then she worked them together in a mixture of hot, soapy water and out emerged this amazing integrated pattern. I thought it made a beautiful photo of the day!

86/365 Spring Fun

Today we had a great time at the Easter Egg Hunt at church and then went to the annual Youth Arts Fest at East Carolina University. We discovered this free event last year, and we won't miss it again. The quad at ECU is full of local artists, community groups and art programs providing opportunities for kids of all ages to play, discover and create. The boys tried all kinds of instruments, made pipe cleaner bugs, created bottle cap necklaces and heard stories from professional story-tellers. They molded clay and designed fabric fish. They are already excited to come back next year!

85/365 We love Aunt Allison!

84/365

83/365 Product Shot

Today's Daily Shoot prompt was to create a product placement shot. After today, the first thing I grabbed was the ibuprofen bottle. Notice that it's empty.

82/365

The Daily Shoot idea for today was to capture a photo that highlights angles. I think I did that, and I get to feature my little man too!

81/365

More fun with shadows! It was interesting to watch the boys problem-solve and work together to figure out how to create the shadow creatures that they wanted to show. This four-armed man was the first of many successful creations.

80/365

Shortly after I took this picture, he popped up and said, "Hey. I have an idea!" That's never a good sign for me or my laundry machine & band-aid stash.

79/365 Long, Winding Road

Today was a beautiful first day of spring. The boys started with their first baseball practice, which went great. We went to the park, rested at home for a bit, visited Goose Creek State Park where we walked the trails and ended up at the Washington Waterfront Park. We couldn't get enough of being outside!

78/365 spring is in the air

and as a bonus, here's David's bright idea.

77/365

I'm in the start of one of my favorite units to teach, rocks and minerals. The kids always get excited. I mean, who doesn't want to get out and dig? The fact that we live near Aurora and PCS Tech, where some of the world's greatest fossil specimens have been found, makes it all the more amazing. I hope my students enjoy their exploration of Earth science as much as I do!

76/365

I think I have a problem.

75/365 Fun in 3's

Spring where are you?!

74/365

Today's Daily Shoot prompt was to photograph a plant. I've been on the road a lot lately, and it seems that this is one of the main types I've seen.

73/365

I missed yesterday (photo 73) so I shall post this one of David at the dentist today in honor of that.

72/365

71/365 Learning

Yesterday after my time at Marbles with the boys, I drove to Cary Academy for the NC Association of Independent School's 5th annual INNOVATE technology conference. I was honored to be asked to join a panel of educators (see my pic) to tackle some of the issues facing education today. We were the feature for Ed Tech Talk Weekly's podcast and were joined live (and virtually) by their co-hosts. I have more thoughts on the whole event and certainly more to tell. Come back, but now it's close to 11pm and my alarm is set for 5:15 am. Sigh.

70/365 Thinking and Learning

Today the boys took a field trip to Marbles Museum in Raleigh. I bow at the feet of my teaching peers who take 120 six and seven year olds on a 2 1/2 hour bus ride to an interactive children's museum. There are no words to express my gratitude, admiration and amazement. While it was a crazy day, they had a time where 2 classes at a time were in a Design Station. Students were charged to create a building or vehicle based on the inspiration of what interesting choices they developed. Tyler was so enthralled in the required inspiration that he had to scoot up close to examine it further. David was much more loose in his interpretation. Can't tell them apart... Ha!

69/365 Time?

After the last 2 weeks, I totally understand why they call it "March Madness."

68/365 Symmetry

Today's Daily Shoot prompt was to find or create symmetry with a photograph. It's not quite symmetry, but it's pretty close for a beautiful, spring day. We left school when the bell rang and have enjoyed playing outside all afternoon! The boys are getting ready for baseball tryouts on Saturday!

67/365 Chatting

My parents are skyping. My sister is skyping. Even my kids are skyping. My class is skyping, too. I'm giving a workshop on skyping to teachers this week. So, what's that all about? It's funny because my parents actually one-upped me on this one. They got back from a trip to Scotland and were going on and on about Skype for making free video-conference calls. Apparently, landlines are so expensive in the UK that many people there use this free service for all of their calls. Anyways, when they got back, they insisted that we pick up a webcam so that they could Skype with their grandbabies (forget us, I know). Since then, the program has taken off worldwide. This pic shows David and Davy chatting over Skype after school today in my room, talking about their day. Talk about bringing down walls!

66/365 Sunset

Today's Daily Shoot prompt was to shoot a picture of a sunrise or sunset. I wasn't up early enough to capture the sunrise (shocking, I know) and the sunset tonight is pretty overcast. I decided to pull another one out of the vault. This picture was taken in 2008 at Carolina Beach State Park where we were camping for the week. Every night we were there, we would leave the campsite and head down to the marina where we could fish, crab and just hang out. It was fun, family time for us and every night's sunset was indescribable. In fact, I have literally hundreds of shots that capture all the stages and phases of the setting sun and the brilliant colors that saturated the sky. Here is one of my very favorite.

65/365 Lemons

David and Tyler love to eat lemons. It's the funniest thing. They will suck the juice out of the lemon, then eat the pulp and then STILL eat the entire rind. At least their systems stay fresh and fruity!

64/365 Things Are Looking Up

Sometimes it's really amazing at what we see when we take the time to look up!

63/365 NC Ties

Today and tomorrow, I am in Raleigh at NC TIES with my colleagues and friends. It's only lunchtime on day 1, but I am already overwhelmed with learning. I've spent time in sessions and personal conversations with people I admire as Ed Tech gurus and am learning so much. I grabbed some lunch and am just relaxing before my own presentation on Going Global with Elementary Students. Walking across the street, I snapped this pic of Sir Walter Raleigh, English Explorer and our state capital's namesake, from outside of the convention center.

62/365 Snow Day

Well, Beaufort County took their first snow day of the year today. Why exactly, I'm not sure. Nonetheless, the boys enjoyed making their first ever snowman. They ended up making a snow mommy and 2 snow boys to go with him. Yes, he's wearing a Cubs hat. And, yes, he has pop-tarts for eyes. Who knows?

61/365 Memories

Davy has taken my camera to school to work on his National Boards and so I'm recycling old photos, which is really quite fun. I have a blast reviewing them over and over. I just don't get tired of it. In honor of the snow they are forecasting tonight, I found this pic from the boys' first snow. We had just moved to Henderson and it snowed SO much that winter. The boys weren't really old enough to enjoy it, but we were all definitely old enough to go stir crazy in a little apartment that January. Wow. That winter was a comedy of errors, without the comedy part. Yet, we survived those first, frigid months and here we are... waiting for more frigid days. Sigh.

60/365 Sheer Joy

The Daily Shoot prompt for yesterday was to create photo that communicates sheer joy. When I read that prompt, I immediately thought back to this picture that I took a few summers ago while we were spending the day in Emerald Isle with friends. David and Tyler got a hold of a small fishing net, and that was "all she wrote." I captured this picture and love the excitement, action and carefree enthusiasm that it shows.