Goodbyes, Owls, and Tears

Well my third year of teaching is coming to an end, and I must say it has been one emotional roller coaster this past week! This group of kiddos have been completely amazing and irreplaceable, and I am having a very hard time "letting them go." I don't know what I will do without them next year. They have certainly left quite a lasting impression on me.

Every Friday in my classroom I give two "snaps" awards to kids from each hour. It could be for turning in all of their work, helping a fellow classmate, basically, any good deed or act. The kids love it and look forward to it each week. Because of the tremendous success of these snaps awards, at the end of my first year of teaching I decided to have one massive "Snaps" celebration during the last week of school and invite parents and family members to watch each kid from our team receive a personalized "Snaps" award. At this celebration I also give out academic achievement awards, future "Mythbuster" and "science teacher" awards, and show a video of pictures of the kids from throughout the year as well as video "confessions" of the kids discussing their favorite memory from science class. At the end of the hour I give each kid a personalized letter from me. It is always a very moving and emotional day, and the kids love seeing how much they have changed since the beginning of the year in the video. Sometimes, I get too emotional and cry at the thought of letting my "babies" leave, and this year was no exception. I bawled my eyes out every hour, and some of the kids cried while they read my letters. I especially felt "extra" emotional this year at the incredibly thoughtful gifts and letters that the kids wrote to me. Here is a picture of my "loot" at the end of the day.

My kids really over-did it this year, and each gift was sweeter than the next! The giant Star Wars bag was filled with things I love, like cherry flavored candy and stickers and necklaces. One parent gave me two huge photo albums filled with pictures of the kids throughout the year, and her daughter wrote comments and notes next to the pictures! I got a few framed pictures of the kids (which I adore) and gourmet coffee and lots of gift cards: 

PLUS, one dad came to my awards and noticed my terrible, horrible, no good, very broken desk chair and brought me this on Friday!

My kids and I decided that this was the most "Evans-ish" chair in existence! I LOVE the purple color and the high back-and it is truly the best chair I have ever seen. It was so nice of him to bring it to me!

Oh, and let me not forget this adorable little gift:

I have a new favorite thing, and it is owls. It all started when my work BFF's Missy and Julie and I bought some adorable owl necklaces at Charming Charlie over Spring Break. Well, they already had them, but I purchased one and wore it to bring my kids luck during MAP testing. I joked to them that owls bring knowledge and it soon became a "thing" in my classroom! I have been obsessed with finding anything "owl-y" as of late and some of my students took the liberty of buying me two owl necklaces and a ring. (I have since discovered that Charming Charlie has a complete owl section-which may be a problem for my bank account.) Needless to say, it was incredibly sweet. 

Plus, these pictures don't include the letters, cards, and heartfelt messages from my kids. It was all so overwhelmingly thoughtful. However, the one thing that brought tears to my eyes was this:

Let me explain. My kids fill out two spiral notebooks (our science journals) during the school year. We glue important pictures, complete labs, take notes, etc. every day in them throughout the year. I tell the kids how important they are and tell them that they should keep them forever and ever and when they graduate from High School and I come to their graduation parties that nothing would make me happier than them showing me their old 6th grade science journals. Well, one of my  kiddos (one who has a reputation of being a tough guy) took both of his completely full spiral notebooks and put each page in a sheet protector and then put everything in a five inch binder. On Thursday he came to school and showed it to me and said, "Miss Evans this isn't really a present for you-but I wanted to show you that my science journals, and I want you to know how important I think they are. That's why I put them in this binder so I can always keep it." I burst into tears and asked him if I could take a picture of him with it. I know it is one of those moments from my teaching career I will always remember. He was a kid who had a tough life and to know that I touched his life and impacted him is what teaching is all about. I felt like I could retire right then and there, and the moment was absolutely priceless.

I will really miss these kiddos, and am already tearing up (again) as I write this. However, at least I have summertime to look forward to! Oh! Where are my manners? I forgot to welcome all of you to my blog! I have lots of plans this summer for home DIY stuff, cupcake baking, recipe sharing, and other randoms and I thought that a blog would be the best way to record my thoughts and talk with people! So thanks for reading! :)