Throwback Thursday: Personal Touches Can Make a Difference

I'm linking up again today with the fabulous Cara Carroll for her weekly linky:

Since we moved into a new house a couple of months ago, I have been having a blast redecorating and adding lots of DIY personal touches around our new house (see a DIY lamp I just made HERE and a DIY frame I just made HERE). So when I was looking through older posts to pick out one for today, I thought it would be fun to throwback to this post I did on personal touches both at home and at school:

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***Originally posted on August 7, 2012***

I love adding personal touches to everything I do. Even as I type this in my cozy living room I am admiring some of the personal touches that make our house feel personable and inviting. Take our entryway for example.

Both the fingerprint tree (everyone at our wedding signed and put their fingerprint on it) and the Foxwell sign are items we used at our wedding and were handmade by dear friends! Don’t you just love them? I also love how our shelf over our couch brings warmth to the room.

This was one of my summer projects and amazing bargain finds: the shelf was only $5 and the old vintage window (which I’m crazy about!) was just $0.50! Can’t beat that! I made the wreath from a pinterest tutorial, which can be found here: http://craftingmom.com/fall-wreath-with-felt-rosettes/. It was easy and fun to make and the supplies only cost $10! Win-win!

I often wonder what in the world I did before pinterest! I use it for everything: lesson planning, decorating, recipes, gift idea. If any of those cause your heart to beat, then be sure to become a follower!

But I digress from the point…pinterest has a way of doing that! My house is not the only place that I love adding personal touches. I also love adding them to my classroom! I mean, just think. Our kiddos are in our rooms for the majority of the day and I want my classroom to be a warm and welcoming environment where they not only want to be, but can also feel safe to learn, grow, and make mistakes! While the classroom environment is affected by a number of factors, the classroom itself is one of the first impressions our students and families see when they walk in. Now of course, on the first day I don’t yet have any of their work hanging, but I LOVE hanging up their handmade beauties all over the room! I think it’s important for them to know that their work is valuable and it also adds those personal touches to the room!

Like most teachers right now my “teacher’s mind” is in full gear and I’ve been busy getting things ready for my students. My classroom isn’t yet set up, so I can’t show you pictures of that yet (but they will come!). But here are just a couple of the personal touches I am working on for my classroom.

I made these letter blocks to sit on my desk as my “nametag.” Found the blocks already cut and sanded for $0.20 a piece at a local thrift store. Used the amazing Cricut to cut out the letters (I heart that machine!) and then mod podged the paper and letters onto the blocks after my amazing friend, Miss Miller, helped paint them a dark brown! Can you tell what colors you will be seeing in my classroom this year?

Doesn't doing things friends always make it more fun? While Miss Miller was painting the blocks, I helped her create this “nametag” for her classroom. 

We found an old wooden picture frame at the local thrift store for only $2.00 and Miss Miller painted it and the wooden blocks black. We used the amazing Cricut again to cut out the letters. Wrapped fabric around the cardboard that came in the frame, then used ribbon and made felt flowers to add some finishing touches! We hot glued everything on and all that’s left is adding a ribbon to hang it! Can’t wait to see how it will look in her room! Can you guess her colors? :) 

The last personal touch I will show you today are these owls that I made out of scrap paper I had at home. I found some cute Owl Felt Ornaments, you guessed it, pinterest, but since it was a pattern for sewing an ornament I had to adapt it a little. 

I chose three colors and interspersed them between the 28 owls I made (enough for my current class and some extras for new students). I’m going to write my students names on the bellies of each owl and since I can’t show my kiddos names I made up one with my name to give you an idea of how they will look!

These will be hung outside of my classroom around the Foxwell Forest trees! Pictures to come soon! I’m getting excited to put everything in the classroom and get it set up!

What kind of personal touches do you like adding to your classroom to make it warm and inviting? I’d love to hear about them!