Aggie Football!

On Saturday Tony and I drove up to College Station with two friends of ours for the football game. Since the game was in the evening, we decided to go early and just make a day of it. Goodness I LOVE College Station! I sure do miss it!

Our first stop was the tent sale. Only, it's not exactly a tent anymore ... it's turned into a warehouse sale. I can only imagine how much money I would have spent if this had been around a few years ago. Surprisingly enough, I didn't buy even one t-shirt! haha who would have thought?!?

After the tent sale we paid to park by Langford and took a walk through campus. We ended up over on Northgate and had lunch at Antonios. YUM! I love their pizza! After our stomachs were filled with some food, it was time for some drinks. We went to dry bean, which is pretty much my long lost love. I forgot how awesome that place is! So many different yummy shots and they are only $3 each. We each bought a round for the group then decided it was time to start pacing since it was only 2:30pm haha.  We went next door to Fitzwillies to sit and relax with a drink for awhile.

After a bit we walked over to west campus where we had a tailgate party to stop by. We hung out there a bit, then had to head out to make it to step off in time. We watched the corps go by then checked out the new MSC. It is SO nice! They did such a good job of keeping the important parts, like the flag room, the same, and making everything outdated so much nicer.

After cooling off and resting a bit, it was game time. Our seats weren't great, first deck by the endzone, but it didn't matter. The weather was great and because the game was a total blowout, people left early and we had tons of space. Any game we win 70-14 is a good one!

After the game the 4 of us went back over to Fitzwillies for dinner, then decided to head back to Houston because we were all exhausted.

It was such a fun day! I cannot wait to go back again in November. yay! :)

CO Trip

Well, summer is officially over for me. I got back from a long weekend in Denver last night and it's back to the grind. I spent the morning up at school getting last minute things ready in my room. Tomorrow and Thursday I have all day trainings, then we officially start back to work on Monday. I really thought that I would be more ready to go back since I didn't work this summer, but that's not so much the case. I have REALLY enjoyed my time off this summer. I am excited to get back to school to start up in reading recovery, but I could use a few more weeks off.

Anyway, back to my quick getaway to Denver. Tony and I flew in to Denver Thursday morning and spent the day with my parents. My dad, Tony, and I spent a few hours that afternoon at the golf course. We played 9 holes and I must say I played pretty well for having not golfed at all since May! That evening we had a big cookout at the house. Woody was in town (with his gf) on his way back from his summer internship in Wyoming, Davis came by with a friend of his, and Bobby, Janet, Aunt Jane, and Uncle David all came over to eat. My dad made BBQ chicken and we all relaxed out by the pool all evening. The weather was PERFECT! I don't know what all those people in Colorado are complaining about ... it wasn't hot at all compared to Houston haha.

Friday Tony and I got up early to head to the mountains. The plan was to backpack for 2 nights ... but things didn't quite go as planned. T got hit by altitude sickness, and despite telling me he was fine and we could stay and camp, his wobbly walking proved otherwise and we ended up taking a nice day hike then heading back in to town.  I think it all worked out great though because we ended up getting to spend a nice weekend with my parents.  I really didn't take many pictures while we were out since we went to the same place last year. I figured I didn't need a repeat of all the same trails etc. Here's one of us on our hike though:

Friday night after we got back to town, everyone met up for dinner again then we stayed up late catching up. Saturday we went golfing again with both my mom and dad. We played this great little par 3 course and I was doing really well. I finally learned how to hit my irons so I felt like a golf rockstar haha.  We went back to the same course on Sunday and I played my best game of golf yet. We played 9 holes and I was 9 over at the end. That means that I averaged bogie on every hole. That's amazingly good for me haha. I'm improving!

All in all a very fun long weekend. It would have been great to camp, but I think it turned out just as fun anyway. Always great to see the family. :)

I changed the look of my blog (finally!), as it was in serious need of an update. If you are reading through google reader head on over to check it out. :)

http://kmccormack.blogspot.com/

Pinterest Project: Sundae Cupcakes

To go along with our hamburger cupcakes and sugar cookie fries, Michelle and I decided to make some ice cream sundae cupcakes. I thought these two would go perfectly together. Check out the original tutorial here.

I just love these. The frosting is what really makes them. It looks like a scoop of ice cream with whipped cream on top, but really it is just two different frostings in different textures.

We made ours a little different. Since we already had a dessert with brownies, we made Dan's chocolate cake (as cupcakes) instead. YUM! The frosting turned out great, just like the original. The only issue we had was with the "whipped cream" frosting. I went ahead and bought a can of white frosting with the tip you can pipe right on. Unfortunately, it was sort of more of a clear/white and mostly just blended in with the other frosting rather than have a completely different look. No worries, they were still awesome. What do you think?

Everyone at the party today loved them.

Pinterest win.

Pinterest Project: Hamburger Cupcakes and Fries

I saw these great cupcakes on pinterest a long time ago and had been looking for an excuse to make them. We're having a big BBQ tomorrow for the fourth of July, and since we will not be having the traditional hamburgers and hot dogs (but rather the most delicious brisket, ribs, and chicken), I thought they would be the perfect addition to our meal.

Michelle came over yesterday to help me put these together. The idea is simple. Bake a yellow cupcake and cut it in half. Bake a pan of brownies, cut circles using a biscuit cutter. Place brownie circle between two pieces of cupcake and pipe frosting on to look like lettuce, ketchup, or mustard. Sprinkle sesame seeds on top to make the cupcake look a little more like the top of a hamburger bun. On the original website, she had a printable for the cute little baskets to put these in so of course I was all over that. And I went ahead and modified the fry package to say Happy 4th of July instead of Happy Father's Day.

The second part of these are the fries. Sugar cookie fries to be exact. The idea for these is also pretty simple. Buy sugar cookie dough, roll out, bake, cut into strips, and sprinkle sugar on top to look like salt.

Here is our finished product:

What do you think? I love them! They were a HUGE hit today at the BBQ! :)

pinterest win.

Pinterest Projects: Story Elements

I am always looking for new fun things to use in my classroom to make ordinary lessons more fun. In first grade we are constantly reviewing story elements in fiction books and practicing retelling the story using beginning, middle, and end.  Doing this so often, it can get boring so I wanted to come up with some new fun ways to work on this skill that the kids would be excited about.  I found two cute ideas on Pinterest, and quickly put them together at the teacher center one afternoon.

First up, the story map board:

First graders LOVE sticky notes. I mean they really LOVE them! Anything automatically becomes a million times more fun if a sticky note is involved. I love this story map because the kids can be actively engaged using sticky notes. Give every kid a sticky note, and assign them a part to listen and record while you are reading. After the story you can review the story elements using the kids sticky notes. If two kids write the same thing (which they should in this instance), just stack their stickies on top of each other. Every kid is actively engaged and having fun. Love it. Here's mine:

Another fun project I found were these story element wands:

These didn't have a tutorial, just the picture, so I just figured out how to make them myself. I used some felt and a di-cut machine to cut out two large stars in each color. Then I used a smaller star di-cut and some white felt to cut the middle of each. Using a sharpie, I wrote each story element on the center piece of the wand (I made: characters, setting, problem, solution, beginning, middle, and end). First, I sewed the small star to the center of a larger star. Then, I cut a piece of quitting batting (just a small square) and placed it between the two big star layers and sewed around the edge, leaving a small space for the stick. At hobby lobby I purchased a set of wooden dowel rides, which I wrapped in glittery ribbon and hot glued inside the star. Simple, and fun.

I really think the kids are going to love using these to practice retelling the story and describing story elements. Can't wait to use them next year!

Pinterest Project: Brownie Batter Cupcakes

It had been awhile since I made any new cupcakes, so one afternoon last week when I got bored I decided to try a new recipe I saw on pinterest.

Unfortunately, I forgot to take pictures of these cupcakes after I was finished, but let me tell you, they were amazing. They looked super cute and they were delicious!! I used a yellow cake mix to make the cupcake but modified the recipe by adding some sugar, sour cream, and vanilla. The cake turned out moist and full of flavor (much better than the simple box cake mix by itself). In the middle of these cupcakes is a bite of brownie, yum! I accidentally made more brownie bites than I needed for the cupcakes so we kept some of those in the fridge to eat as a bite size treat. That is the first dessert I have found that I cannot keep Tony away from. Those brownie bites inside are DELICIOUS! You could make that as a treat all on it's own.

I sent a dozen of these to work with Tony (because we don't need to be fatties and eat 18 cupcakes all ourselves) and they were devoured by the end of the day. Definitely a hit. If you like the taste of brownie and are looking for a good cupcake, I suggest you try these.

another pinterest win.