without further ado...

i present you with pictures of our classroom:

(view from the staircase leading down)
their toy area

tada! our classroom side

i took $1 sesame street flashcards (which we already owned) and hole punched them, then strung into a banner. one is for shapes, one is for numbers
the boys "school" table

train table, my desk, peanut's playpen and the "reading sofa" as bubba calls it

reading corner again

our learning poster, day of the week sign and weather signs

all set up for this week's lessons!
B took this tonight while i was painting some scenes from eric carle books to go up on the walls, this is my desk :)

the very hungry caterpillar

and morphed into a beautiful butterfly

so, the best part: we were able to do all of this and we only spent $60. we purchased the foam puzzle mat flooring ($40) and then spent about $20 on the posters/wall hangings/and some general school supplies from the dollar tree. next time we're at sam's club we need to get another package of flooring...i underestimated the square footage of the area!

and the greatest part in all of this? how excited bubba and pooks are! they are beyond thrilled. they love playing in the ''vasement''....i think it's a combination of newness, toys they haven't seen in months and they really like learning. bubba asked me several times if we were going to have school today, he just can't wait. even peanut was squealing and crawling around down there! overall i think it was a huge success!

be on the look out...

for pictures of our new ''school'' as the little dudes call it.

i had the great idea to clean out half of our disorganized, cluttered and full of total crap unfinished basement, to used as a playroom/classroom. it's a good sized space and it has a full size window that lets in a lot of light. while it's all cement and drywall i knew that if we tried hard enough we could (in the words of tim gunn) "make it work". my goal was to have a nice, clean, SAFE place for the kids to play and learn without spending a lot of money. we already had 2 art easels, a little tikes table, 2 totes of toys and basic shelving. so with the help of b, nanaw and papa (and the dollar tree) i was able to do just that!

i will post pics sometime tomorrow evening. i want to let the little dudes see it first (they were so excited that they couldn't fall asleep!) and i want to snap the pics in daylight :)