New Year New Grade!

I am very excited to begin this new school year as a second grade teacher! These past few weeks have felt like a whirlwind, and I am pretty sure a tornado landed in my new room!

Whew! I get worn out just looking at his picture again!  It has taken a lot of hard work, not only from me but from many of my family members.  My mom came down and spent a Friday night helping me organize my filing cabinet.  Then my sweet husband spent many nights moving furniture, hanging things up on the wall for me, and lowering desks.  Check out his little helper!

But I am happy to say that with Open House tomorrow afternoon, my classroom is very close to being ready for my brand new second graders! I am so excited to see them all, and excited that I already know many of them! 

This is going to be a great year, and I can't wait to get started!!!!!

Summer time!!!!

Well it is officially summer time!  It's time for slow mornings spent with a very divatastic little girl.  We will be playing dress up in whatever princess costume we put together, rocking baby dolls, and singing our ABCs. This summer will be spent at the beach or the pool, cooking out with friends and family, and letting Bella play outside for as long as she wants because we have nowhere to be the next day!  I have been looking forward to this for a very long time and I am plan on soaking up every minute of it.  I hope you all have a fabulous summer with the ones you love, doing whatever it is you love!

How could you not want to spend your summer with this little princess?!! Love her!

My little ladybug turned two!!

My very own little ladybug turned two on the 25th of this month, and I wanted to share this picture from her party! I am a very proud mommy!

Career Brochures

We are now busy at work researching all the careers the kids have chosen for our upcoming Career Day Tea.  They have chosen some very exciting careers this year.  We have several nurses, a couple of police officers, soliders, a gymnast, a ballerina, a zookeeper, and a custodian!  After the students have researched their careers the complete a brochure that will be presented at our tea in June.  As soon as we have some completed brochures, I will be posting pictures.  So check back soon!

Here they are! :)

Well with alot of hard work we got our Mother's Day Cookbooks completed!  The kids did such a great job, and I have a feeling we had alot of happy moms this past weekend.  I wanted to share some of the pages with you.

We started working on Mother's Day Cookbooks today!  This is always a very fun project for me to do with my students.  It's definitely a great time when you get to hear how mom's make their kids favorite meals....in the words of their children.  I have everything from Macaroni and Cheese to apple pie to Microwavable Pizza!!  Stay tuned for pictures of our final product!

Revamping again!

Ok so I had grand plans of making this new blog a huge part of my classroom. Unfortunately I am not allowed to post student work or show anything we do in the classroom on this blog.  I have to do it on one created through the school system.  SOOOOO I think I am going to go back to my orginal idea for a blog, one about being a wife, mommy, and teacher.   Stay tuned!!

Great Start!

We had a fabulous start to the new school year!  I am so excited about my wonderful students.  I will be posting some exciting things over the next week, as we begin our unit on "All About Me"!

The Safari Scoop

Check out our August-September newsletter, The Safari Scoop, by clicking this link http://www.catawbaschools.net/schools/LyleCreek/staff/neely_barham/Newsletters/Forms/AllItems.aspx

Excited for a new school year!

Cereal Boxes and Reading!

To my Fabulous First graders!
Please save a cereal box to bring into school.  We will be creating something very exciting using these cereal boxes.  Here is a hint....you will have your very own book collection!!  See you soon :)

Great Idea!

I found this from whattheteacherwants.blogspot.com on Pinterest.  I would love to do this for my students on the first day of school!!

Source: whattheteacherwants.blogspot.com via Ashley on Pinterest

A Work in Progress

Working on switching around the room, so I can turn it into a Jungle!!!

Based on the current disaster, it looks like I am well on my way :)

Guess who loves spaghetti!!!

Revamped!!

Welcome to my new revamped blog!  This blog will be largely focused on the happenings of my first grade classroom :)  However, if you know me, I would never be able to not share and talk about what is going on with my family (mainly my own little Diva).  I hope you enjoy following my blog, and that you will share any exciting news, ideas, or even just comments on my Diva-Tastic space! 

I need some creativity!!!

I have been checking out so many amazing blogs, and I have been inspired to continue and update the one I created many months ago. This always seems to be my goal, but I lose track along the way. However I really am going to try and write on this one several times a week. Really I am!


I am currently trying to revamp my original blog. I found a fabulous new background on the website, The Cutest Blog on the Block and now I am trying to think of a catchy new name. I would like this blog to be a mixture of my family life as well as my career in teaching. Any suggestions??

Happy New Year!

2010 has been a year of many emotions for me and my family. The loss of my dad was the hardest thing I have ever experienced. There is not a day that goes by that I do not think of him, and wish he was still here. I have a feeling there is a little 7 month old that would have him wrapped around her finger!

This brings me to the next life changing event that occured in 2010. Matt and I were blessed on May 25th at 11:04 pm to welcome Isabella Grace into the world. She is the most amazing and beautiful thing that has ever happened to us.

We have many things to look forward to in 2011.
1) Help Emily finish plan her wedding
2) Emily and Ace get married on June 18th
3) Bella's 1st birthday on May 25th
4) Meet Presley Reynolds and Braydon Bowman
5) Shannon and Nick's wedding party in Hickory

Like I said...lots of exciting things to come in 2011! Can't wait to share them all with friends and family.

Oh and I forgot...as I am typing this post I am also finishing up my last paper in grad school (well that is if I can stop procrastinating and actually work on it)! I am so glad to be finished, and spend all my free time with Bella and Matt :)

Bella and her first snow!

A White Christmas 2010

Well today was Bella's very first Christmas. It was a bittersweet day, because it was our first Christmas without my dad. He always worked very hard to make sure every Christmas was special for us. I thought of this as we watched the snow cover the ground and give us a white Christmas for the first time (that I can remember). I know it was his way of making sure his granddaughter had a very special first Christmas!

Bella certainly did have a special day! Santa brought her very first phone, and it is even pink! She also got all kinds of new toys and fun new outfits, which mommy can't wait to try on her! Nana gave her a snugly new baby doll, and precious outfit. Grandma and Papaw gave her a brand new wagon, that I know she can't wait to ride in when it gets warmer :). Oh and I also can't forget about her special Christmas tutu that she wore today! It was quite possibly the cutest thing in the world!

As much as I enjoyed seeing Bella play with all of her toys, the best part of my day was seeing her excitement as she played with her cousins, grandparents, aunts, and uncles. She was happy to just have someone to talk to. I received a picture frame from one of my students this year, and around the frame it says, "The best things in life aren't things." This is definitely a quote that rings true! We are blessed to have such a fabulous family and wonderful friends. I hope everyone of you had a Merry Christmas, just as we did!

Until next time....

Bella

I have decided I am going to try and keep our blog updated. It is hard to believe the last time I posted on here, little Bella was still in my tummy. She is now already 6 months old, and is changing so much each day. She is such a blessing to our lives, and I cannot imagine what we did before she was with us. I am going to try to post pictures and update our blog as often as possible. Until next time...

Matt felt her kick!

Sorry it has been a while since the last post. It has been a busy busy time right now. We do have an exciting update, I have been feeling Miss Isabella for a couple of weeks now. However Matt was becoming a little jealous that he hasn't been able to feel her little kicks yet. Well he got his chance this past Sunday (Valentine's Day) during church, I am pretty sure she was dancing to the music and he got to feel her kick twice! It was a very exciting moment for the both of us. We go back to Charlotte next week for the doctor to take a closer look at her heart. They do not expect to find anything, they are just wanting to be sure. I will let everyone know how it goes. Until next time....Neely, Matt, and Bella :)

It's A Girl!!!

Hey everyone, as you all know this past month has been a very emotional one. My dad was an amazing person, who was very much looking forward to being a grandpa! It is hard to imagine how we are going to go on without him, but I know he is looking down on us and watching over us.

To update everyone one our our baby Barham, we did find out that it is going to be a little girl! We were all very shocked, but could not be more excited! Matt is actually working on her nursery, as I type this post. Our level II ultrasound went very well, and they said everything looked as it should. We do have to go back in February so they can take a closer look at her heart, but they do not expect to find anything out of the ordinary. Just please keep our family in your prayers as we move forward. Until next time!

Update!

We went to the doctor this past Monday for a checkup. Not a very exciting visit mainly just bloodwork, however our nurse was very entertaining. We also got to hear our little one's heartbeat again! The rate was between 145 and 150, the doctor said she was having a hard time keeping up with the baby because it kept moving around so much! Sounds like we are going to have a lively one! Less than two weeks until we find out what we are having, and we couldn't be more excited! Check back soon :)

We heard the heartbeat!!!

I am almost out of my first trimester!!! Yaaaaaaaay! Very excited about that. As of this past Tuesday, I am now 12 weeks. We went to the doctor and got nothing but great news. The doctor said everything looked great, and then we got to hear the heartbeat! As soon as the doctor put the little microphone on my tummy she heard the baby's heartbeat. She said that is the fastest she has ever heard a heartbeat at only 12 weeks, and that we have nothing to worry about with this little one. Sounds like Baby Barham is going to be a busy little baby! My next doctor's appointment is on December 15th, but nothing exciting is planned....just blood work. YUCK!

Today, I found out we are going to find out what we are having on December 28th! Can't believe it is already almost that time. We were hoping to be able to find out before Christmas, but this gives us something to look forward to!

2nd Appointment

Well we went to the doctor this morning and had another ultrasound. We didn't get to hear the heartbeat yet, but we did get to see it! Very cool! The heart rate was 161 bpm. They have moved my due date back to June 1st, so I am not as close as I thought I was to being out of the first trimester, but it's ok, hopefully I won't have anymore days like last Friday....fingers crossed. The doctor said we should be able to hear the heartbeat at our next appointment in November. We are also hoping to be able to find out the gender by the end of December. Lots of exciting things to come!

Introducing Baby Barham

Well I want to welcome everyone to our baby's blog! We hope to use this blog to keep everyone up to date on what is going on with Baby Barham, who is scheduled to arrive on May 24th. :)

I will be 9 weeks on Monday, so we are still very early. The baby is currently the size of a kidney bean! We are going to the doctor on Monday, and are crossing are fingers that we are going to get to hear the heartbeat. I will post an update then!