Happy Easter, Award, and.....Giveaway!

Happy Easter everyone! **(Well, it was Easter when I started this post! :-/  Then it got late, and I seriously needed my bed.)  I hope it has been a blessed day with family and friends!  It was an absolutely beautiful day!  Mom came to my church today to see our Easter cantata.  The cantata went really well!  People really seemed to enjoy it and the choir got through the songs well, and the actors remembered their lines and did a great job!  Phew!  (It was a little rough the other day at practice!)  It was a great service!
So.....is it bad that I still feel the strong need to get a new dress each Easter??  I haven't seemed to grow out of that yet!  I thought this dress was too cute and was excited to wear it today!

  After church we went home, got changed, and went to my aunt and uncle's house for Easter dinner with their family.  We enjoyed some good fellowship and laughs and great food!  This was so good for mom to be able to get out and engage with people.  She seems to be less social lately, I think she is starting to struggle more with conversation and finishing sentences.  She enjoyed joking with my uncle, and he definitely got her laughing, it was great to see and hear her joke with him!  It was a wonderful day!!
Then Pamela, at First Class Teacher, was sweet enough to award me the Lovely Blog Award again.

I am so glad she found me, because I was able to find her super cute blog!! I'm really looking forward to stalking her blog more!  Thank you so much, Pamela!  The rules state that I am to pass this award on to 15 other blogs, but I know many of you already have gotten this award.  But, there are a few new blogs that I have started following that I would like to pass this on to.  I think they really deserve it, and hope it will be as much of an encouragement to them as it was to me!   Here they are:

Bekah at Mrs. Mason's Monkeys
Jessica at Learn, Play, and Have Fun
Sam at A Teacher's Looking Glass
Rachel at A-B-Seymour
Katy at Stickers and Staples
Casey at Miss Casey's Corner
Summyr at The Teachaholic
Monica at Classroom Capers
Ammie at Giggles and Squeals
Debbie at Ms. Squier's 3rd Grade Thinkers
Scholes at My Days as a Third Grader
Teacher Bug at Read and Black and Learning All Over
Sally at The Fearless 5th Grade Teacher
That's my few, I didn't realize there were that many newer ones I was following that might not have already received this reward.  Please go by and visit these blogs!  These ladies have some great ideas, and some super cute blogs!! :)  I'm sure they would appreciate some new followers and some encouraging comments, as we all do.
Now....on to the news that oddly enough I'm almost afraid to share, how weird is that??!?  But I did already give a heads up that this might be coming.  I have enjoyed taking part in many of the different giveaways that have been going on, and I wanted to have one, too.  I had planned to do it for 50 followers, but as I told you before, because of joining in with some fun linky parties, it went past that before I could do it.
So....for my 75+ follower-belated Happy Easter-looking forward to a fun weekend-so thankful for my wonderful follwers {breathe} giveaway, I am giving away a $15 Target gift card!!

I guess I'm a tad afraid, as others have said, that no one will enter, but then I think...hmm...well, then I would just get to use it for myself!  Hee hee. :)  But, I would love to give it away to one of you, my amazing teacher friends, you have encouraged my heart so much these past few months as I have embarked on this teacher blogging journey!  I have another post that I am hoping to share very soon about what this and you all have done for me as a teacher.  So, thank you, and pleeeeaaaseee enter!
I am a pretty simple girl, as you can probably tell by my blog and shops, and I'm not all creative and crafty, so I don't have fancy things for you to do to enter.  I like to be different, hee hee.

So...here are the ways to enter the giveaway:

1.  Become a follower of my blog, or tell me you already follow and leave a comment.

2.   If you feel so inclined, share my giveaway with others and leave a comment that you did.

3.  Tell me which you like better or recommend more, Random Number Generator or Rafflecopter, and why.

4.  Share any funny thing that has happened to you or in your class.  I love to get good laughs!

Oh and don't forget to leave your email address with your comments so I can contact the winner.

So, yea, that's it, the contest will end Saturday night, April 14, after I get back from seeing Fiddler on the Roof!!! :) So excited!  (And the day after Ricky Schroder's 42nd birthday! :-D)

One last thing, today was a windy day with some strong gusts.  When that happens there are screw-type things in the ceiling that move and squeak.  When my students heard it, I told them as I have with others before, that it's just the rat that lives in the ceiling.  Then they looked at the ceiling and finally noticed the slight movements of the screw-type things, which makes my story even more believable. hee hee  They look at me, and at the ceiling, and I have gotten pretty good at hiding my grin, as they try to figure out if I'm being serious or not.  Today, I actually had to laugh out loud because my little girl tried to figure it all out.  She said, "I know, she is downloading that sound from her computer, and using her X-Ray power eyes to move that thing!"  Hahaha!  I love it when they think I have powers! :)