Welcome to First Grade!

Our summer is officially over.  Those lazy days filled with late bedtimes, relaxed schedules and living at a slower more enjoyable pace have ended and we are headed into another wonderful albeit busy school year.

Monday afternoon we attended Open House/Meet the Teacher and you could see the excitement in my little guy as he ran up to classmates he hasn't seen all summer with a huge smile and ready to share information about what's been happening in their time away from one another.  We entered his classroom, found his desk and learned what could be expected this year -- we even got the chance to snag a picture of the school mascot!

Last year I decided I would start a school tradition, first day of school pics which you can see in my Back to School post.  So to keep with tradition, I redesigned his sign to welcome him to first grade.

I searched the school website for a picture of the mascot and saved it to my computer.  Using PicMonkey, I used the 'Create a Collage' feature.  After playing around with different collages, I decided the one that worked best was 'Square Deal'.  I wanted this year's sign to reflect the school itself, so the first order of business was to change the background color to yellow.  I then uploaded the mascot picture and placed it in the first square.  I had to make some adjustments to the size of the squares because the picture was so large and I didn't want to loose any of it with a crop.  Once I was happy with it, I moved on to adding the very cool school paper 'Swatch' feature to the bottom two squares.  Perfect!  Now, it was time to click the 'Edit' button in order to add the text.  In the second square using the 'Bilbo Swash Caps' and 'Impact' fonts, I wrote "Welcome to First Grade" in the coordinating blue color.  In the two bottom squares, using the new 'Freshman' font I added the text "First Day of School" and the date he started.  Aaa-mazing!

I printed this on a piece of cardstock, replaced last year's sign with this one and look....another memory in the making!

 Happy first day of school my little prince, I know this is going to be an awesome year for you!

Where we like to party!

Guest Post #2 - Life After Laundry

I'm back again this week hanging out and sharing a post over at Life After Laundry.

Last week I shared my Back to School post with her readers.  As we all prepare our little (and not so little) ones to head back to school, I thought this week it would be great to help them get everything organized with the Homework Station post.

Be sure to hop on over there and give Brenna some bloggy love!

Wordless Wednesday {Almost} #5

Hi there!  It has been a very busy few weeks for me, now finally my little family and I are enjoying a much needed beach vacation.

My hope is to be back on track next week when we return, so until then I hope you enjoy a little slice of our vacation heaven!

Guest Post - Life After Laundry

Guess who has her first guest blog post?  Yup, you guessed it...it's me!  And let me just say that I am more than excited about this opportunity.  Growing as a blogger feels really good!

I met Brenna from Life After Laundry at a blogging conference this past May.  She is quite an amazing crafter/DIYer and seriously, I'm totally jealous of her sewing ability {she has offered to teach me how to sew, but well...you all know how I feel about my arch nemesis - LOL!}.

With a new linky party, a craft challenge this month and oh yeah...her family to take care of, she is a very busy lady.  Since her schedule is so full, I jumped at the chance to do something I've honestly been afraid to do...my first guest post.

With school about to start, I resurrected my Back to School post to get everyone prepped and ready for a new school year.  Be sure to hop on over and check it out and be sure to let me know what you think of my very first Guest Appearance.  {smile}