Monday Made It- June 29th

It's Monday again and time for Monday Made It. 

(okay, so its Tuesday now, but still posting....)

Last week was LONG, but in a super good way. All my hard work from last week's MMI, paid off and CAMT 2015 was a success. Read about that experience here. 

CAMT truly motivated me to get some stuff completed that I had just sitting on my computer. 

I finished my first 3rd grade product. 

I also finished my 8th grade Personal Financial Literacy Flippables that has been sitting on my computer for a few months. Texas teachers are "hungry" for this stuff. Of course, now I need to get 7th done so I have 6th-8th and then oh yea, 3rd grade for my own students this year!!! I'll just add that to the list as well. 

I "made" a twitter account last night. I am clueless to how to use it, but I will learn. If your around there, follow me @HodgesHerald and I will follow you back. 

And lastly, I had to make something for my classroom. I started making this last week, and finished today. I really want to instill some deep number sense with  my students this next year. I plan to use this not only as an early finishers board, but also as a station in my room during some weeks. I guess time will tell how it plays out. I love the brightness and it will fit with my room perfectly! 

This will be posted in a pocket chart, but for summer, it is packed away. 

Want a free copy of this? Click here! ENJOY! 

Until next week.... 

CAMT 2015

CAMT 2015 is complete and it was F-U-N! 

Last year I went as a participate. This year was completely different. I presented and I was part of an exhibitor booth with 4mula Fun. 

It was quite the adventure. 

My family helped me set up the night before: 

When I got there I saw this super cute poster Jennifer had made about our sessions.

Ready for the next day. 

 After getting back to our hotel, I got giddy over my name tag and 

seeing my name in the conference book. 

Wednesday morning, I was both nervous and excited AND EARLY! I had to make sure everything worked and was ready! 

At 9:00am, I was set up and ready. My session started at 10am. There were about 5 people in the room. I thanked them for coming and went to get coffee. I waited in a line for about 20 minutes and returned to my session. The room was full! We still had 40 minutes until it was supposed to start! 

This was at 9:30!!!!! 

The session went GREAT and I was so glad people were interested. Seriously, everyone was so super nice! 

I headed to the booth and met more amazing people! My next session was at 1:00pm. I headed over there about 12:15ish. What I experienced was mind blowing. I couldn't get through one of the double doors because of so many people. I thought, oh great, what is going on? I walked through another set of doors and went close to my door. A CAMT volunteer said, "Are you the presenter?" I said "Yes." She said, "Uh, all these people are waiting for you!" 

Seriously, these people had started lining up before noon. Do you see the woman eating standing up? Thank you so much everyone for making me feel so appreciated. 

The room only fit 50 people, so many had to be turned away. I still feel guilty about that. Thankfully, I was able to meet many of those people at the booth. 

Both sessions were awesome and everyone was receptive and super nice. 

Now, for the exhibit. 

I was also not ready for what would happen there. 

Teachers are hungry, hungry for great products that make their lives easier and that engage their students. I was selling some of my task cards on a CD and had only made 25 for the first day. I sold out and had to take orders! That night after dinner and pool time with my family, I burned a lot more to sell the next two days. 

Beginning of Day 2 

I wasn't nearly as early this day, or the last day either. 

Then, the coolest thing happened. I met Elizabeth Hodges!!!! 

We thought it crazy and cool that we had the same name. Then we found out we had the same middle name too! SHUT THE FRONT DOOR! Right? 

We spell it differently though. Whew! That would have been downright spooky! 

 Elizabeth Anne Hodges meet Elizabeth Ann Hodges 

And this is what our booth looked like almost all of the time. 

It was insane and fun all at the same time,. 

We also played Cornhole the first two days. It was so crazy. We didn't get to play as much as we wanted. It was fun though. 

Day 3 was shorter, but just as busy and fun. 

We met so many wonderful people and talked with as many as we could. 

Got to see our friend Danielle from Live. Love. Math. 

Love this new mommy to be!

And on the way home, these lucky boys got to take a nap. 

Me, not so much. My job was to keep my husband awake even though I was wiped out! 

Had a great time and looking forward to #CAMT2016 in San Antonio. 

TpT Seller Challenge- Week 2

Week 2 for the TpT Challenge is about blogging our dreams. 

I'm not a big dreamer. At least I don't think I am. But this is making me think what I want out of my TpT experience. 

First and foremost TpT for me is about medical expenses. If you follow my blog, you know I have a hearing impaired son who wears hearing aides. Plus, he has a disease that eats the tissue around his ears. This has to be removed surgically. It continues to grow and in his 9 years he has had 7 ear surgeries. Most of what I  make on TpT goes to  his medical expenses. I won't lie and say all of it does yet. I do buy stuff for my own classroom and I have been known to order something online and use TpT monies. So, my dream is to NOT HAVE ANY UNPAID MEDICAL BILLS! 

Secondly, I would like my business to grow so my family and I can travel more and make improvements to our home. I would love a new fence and a  deck and a remodeled kitchen, etc... you get the point. 

Thirdly, my long term goal is to grow my business so I can retire and supplement my income. 

I recently learned that I can actually retire in 7 years. SEVEN YEARS!!!! Holy Moly! I cannot actually imagine retiring at such a young age, Seriously, I will only be 51! I will be eligible for retirement, but not 100% and no, I probably won't retire. BUT... if I am dreaming and my store has taken off, maybe, just maybe I could.

 A girl can dream, right? 

Monday Made It- CAMT Edition

It's time for Monday Made It again with Tara over at 4th Grade Frolics! 

This week I have been finishing projects I have been working on for months and I do mean months. 

Tomorrow, I will head to Houston (Texas) for CAMT. CAMT stands for Conference of Advanced Mathematics Teaching. It's a HUGE conference here in Texas held yearly. This year, I am presenting AND sharing a booth with Jennifer from 4mula Fun. I am both excited and scared out of my mind! 

My presentation is over using Task Cards in the classroom. I have spent all year using task cards and documenting how to make this work in a middle school classroom. 

My presentation

My handouts and baggies for them to kept their task cards in. 

Labels completed! 

Then, the decision to join Jennifer for a booth. Holy Moly! I have really opened a can of worms. Prep, Prep and more Prep! 

I am selling a CD with 20 task cards included for a CAMT exclusive price, just for TEXAS teachers. I burned some already and will burn more while we are there. (just in case) I love how they turned out. 

I had to make all 20 sets for display and my husband made this great display stand for me. It will be painted and finished before we leave on Tuesday. (he is the procrastinator, not me!)

I am also selling my Game Board Bundle at a discounted price. 

I have my Test Taking Strategies posters, already printed. Those are bagged and ready to go. 

Instant Bulletin Board! 

Plus, we have lots of FREEBIES to give away. Of course, I have been prepping those. I feel like this is never ending.  Jennifer has created a fun Cornhole (beanbag toss) game for people who visit our booth for chances to win prizes! 

I have made lists and lists and I am hoping I haven't forgotten anything. This is my first endeavor of this kind and I am S-C-A-R-E-D! 

If you're a Texas teacher and you are heading to CAMT this week, be sure to stop by booth 407 and say hello to us. 

For you non-Texas teachers, make sure you follow me on Instagram (hodgesgal23) because I will posting lots of pictures this week to share the F-U-N with you!