GrowinginPre-K and K: Thirteen in '13 Linky Party

Today I am joining the Thirteen in '13 Linky Party.

2013 has been a year full of transitions for me. My husband's transfer meant leaving the town I had lived in since high school, one of my adult sons, a Pre-K teaching job I loved, a house I considered perfect, and many wonderful friends. We moved one day after dropping our youngest child off in her college dorm on my fiftieth birthday!!

I made a conscious decision to "bloom where I was planted." So, four months later our home feels homey, my kids all managed to come for Thanksgiving and Christmas, and in January, I will be teaching kindergarten at a school I have been subbing at. God is good!

For some reason, this also seemed like a good year to change my blog to GrowinginPreK.blogspot.com. I had added a blog to my original site, GrowinginPreK.com, but got tired of the very old technology on that site. So, I plan to leave the old site up indefinitely, but anything new is posted to GrowinginPreK.blogspot.com.

Now, I am going to attempt to fit my 2013 into these topics...

13. Favorite article of clothing:

I treated myself to this black coat a few weeks ago. Funny- it's longer on me than it is on the model. It is cold here a lot more than it was in Houston, so I deserve it :).

12. Favorite movie you watched:

I watched Despicable Me 2 on dvd with my family last night - fun!

11. Favorite TV series:

Downton Abbey

10. Favorite restaurant:

Gloria's (Mexican)

9. Favorite new thing you tried:

Recovering a chair seat - I also painted this thrift store find with chalk paint, but I had done that before.

8. Favorite gift you got:

Santa brought me a Nikon camera. As much as I love taking pictures, I have never had a "real" camera. I am looking forward to learning how to use it!

7. Favorite thing you pinned:

How do you choose just one?!

This is the next thing I plan to make for my classroom:

This is one of my favorite pins for home:

I want to create a gallery like this on our stairs wall!

6. Favorite blog post:

While I continued to organize it, I didn't actually participate in GrowinginPreK's Gingerbread Man Exchange this year (since I didn't have my own class....). Several great teachers sent me photos to use on the blog:

HERE and HERE

I loved seeing what they did with the Exchange in their classrooms.

5. Best accomplishment:

Presenting a session on read aloud activities at the Houston Area Association of Early Childhood Educators. (Once upon a time I was deathly afraid of public speaking.)

4. Favorite picture: My kids in our Christmas card photo