Why do ECE have to do self assessments?

Seeing this question a lot in CPL support groups! 'I already did the self assessment do I have to do it again at the start of a new two year cycle?'

Yes, we we do - there’s a chart on the college website that shows what you need to do in year one vs year two of the cycle. So if you’ve completed a full two year cycle than you start back at Year One is doing a new self assessment, new learning plan, and new record of learning for the new cycle.

In my opinion a new self assessment is required because over course of two year period the field changes - so there could be new regulations that effect our work, new laws that affect our work, new research on best practices and so forth may have emerged that would affect our work, our roles change as we might get promoted or have a student to mentor for first time, our job focus changes throughout our career or we change employers, we change our setting from centre to school or early years program or what not. Plus even if nothing at all like that has changed ideally as a RECE with two more years under our belt we’ve GROWN and that might change our self assessment reflections 😉

I love this quote from John Dewey .... the reflection component of the College of ECE's Continual Professional Learning process is the MOST important part of the process. The Self assessment has us reflect on our work in relation to the Code of Ethics and Standard of Practice for the profession. After engaging in professional learning taking the time to truly reflect on not only what we gained from the experience but how we plan to use that to implement change or improvement in our practice!

I have engaged in continuous professional learning for over 30 years now. I am a dedicated life long learner as it is how I recharge my energy and soul to ensure that I remain passionate about our field. However I am grown enough to admit that the 'reflecting' on the professional learning I engage in to ensure that I actually transfer that new knowledge into working practice has sometimes been lacking. There is little use to have a brain full of amazing knowledge and book smarts galore if we struggle to actually implement that in our daily lives with the children, families and community partners we work with!

Have an amazing day!

Margaret

Live Well, Laugh Often, Love Much

Be Totallyawake4-life

Charcuterie lunch

Because “charcuterie” is just way more fun to say than “meat, cheese, veggie tray”!

I really do love the Whisps crackers though - perfect crunchy cracker replacement without the grainy side effects! They definitely help to curb that 'chip/cracker' craving!

 

The Garden Vegetable Dip from Epicure is totally Nom nom!

 Basically did 3/4 cup of Greek Yogurt with 1 tablespoon of mayo and 1 tsp on Garden Vegetable seasoning.

There are so many ways you can use the seasonings from Epicure!

• Dip: Combine Garden Veggie Dip Mix with mayo and sour cream or yogurt.
• Season: Stir into scrambled eggs, omelets, soups, and broths.
• Salad Dressing: Whisk ¼ C (60 ml) prepared dip with 1 C (250 ml) buttermilk and 1 Tbsp (15 ml) vinegar.
• Spread/Cheese Ball: Mix 1 Tbsp (15 ml) dip mix in 1 C (250 ml) cream cheese. Form into a ball and roll in blend.

 I am still trying to grasp the whole 'macro' counting with Keto lifestyle ... this lunch was a little high in the carbs despite having no grains cause I keep forgetting that dairy has carbs!

Bon Appetite! 

Margaret
Live Well, Laugh Often, Love Much
Be Totallyawake4-life

*post contains affiliate links

Chipotle Bacon & Egg salad

Nom nom loving all the inspiration and knowledge being shared from Lynn Grushka in her Healthy Keto Life Community Group - today’s offering is Chipotle Bacon and Egg salad for lunch today!

Getting closer to the macro goal - definitely takes some rethinking of the brain to embrace all the healthy fats!

I made my Chipotle dressing using 1 tsp Epicure Chipotle & Cheddar seasoning, stirred into 1 tbsp mayo, 1 tbsp coconut vinegar and 1 tablespoon 35 % whipping cream for a nice creamy dressing with a tiny kick of heat.

Bon Appetite 

Margaret 

Live Well, Laugh Often, Love Much

Be Totallyawake4-life

*this post contains affiliate links

Don’t toss your scraps!

I am back with another challenge from over at Scrapbook Nerds and Friends featuring the Concord and 9th Birthday Basics turnabout stamp set available on their website. 

I had a little scrap leftover from my last 100th Birthday card I made earlier this month!

 

My motto is never throw out your scraps because I used it to make this adorable second birthday card! 

Paired the scrap with some sponged glitter paper, Nuvo drops and Wink of Stella for a quick and simple sparkly card!

Happy Stampin'

Margaret
Live Well, Laugh Often, Love Much
Be Totallyawake4-life

*this post contains affiliate links

It’s Official

Squee .... I am so exited. It is officially being announced today! 

I get to try my hat at being a part of the Scrapbook Nerds creative  team! 

Thank you so much for the opportunity and I am looking forward to playing with my creative team goodies and the upcoming design challenges ... make sure to head on over to their Facebook group so you can play along with the challenges too  💕

Happy Stampin'

Margaret

Live Well, Laugh Often, Love Much

Be Totallyawake4-life

*this post contains affiliate links 

Advocacy for ECE

 There is lots of talk in the CPL groups on Facebook lately about creating 'noise' and an 'uprising' around challenges faced in the early learning and care field. ECE have created groups like ECE's Unite to try to organize province wide strikes and other initiatives! 

 

I admire their passion about wanting change in our field - over the past 30 years I have seen many times and many different groups try to organize walk outs and other strike type advocacy campaigns only to see them fall flat or backfire on ECE whose employer fired or reprimanded them for taking what amounts to illegal strike action and other work to rule behaviors that many ECE do not realize they cannot engage in when they are not protected by a Union and the Labor laws that apply to unionized workers!

 

I am all for advocating for change and improvement in our field but I cannot help but want to encourage these ECE that as members of a regulatory body now with the government mandate of the College of ECE we need to be very careful in HOW we advocate for change. The language we choose and the manner we choose to advocate and so forth and ensure it is done in a way that does not violate the code of conduct or Professional standards of the College. 

 

The AECEO is our designated professional association in Ontario whose mandate is to advocate for all these things and in my opinion we should be working through these exsisting infrastructures that know the rules and laws and are experts in the advocacy they have been engaged in for decades now.  These same people seem to whine that the AECEO is not doing 'enough' but the reality is that sadly their membership is very low compared to the College of ECE because it is a voluntary organization and ECE just do not choose to belong to it for various reasons. However if all the eligible ECE in Ontario joined the AECEO than they would have a much much larger budget to work with in social media campaigning, in actively having staff who were lobbying at a government level and so forth to be our 'collective voice'. Its been a long time since I sat on the London AECEO branch board but back than the total membership for the AECEO was minuscule and I do not imagine it has grown much in the past decade in comparison as with the College of ECE many former members left because they did not think they needed to have both memberships. However the College is NOT an advocacy body it is a regulatory body they ultimately serve the public   ... it is hard for the AECEO to create a collective voice when so few of us belong to it or actively support it. After 30 years in the field my active advocacy energy is dwindling but I am still a paid member of the Association to support those who still have the energy to 'fight' the good fight.

 

I know many people feel that having to pay yet another fee to belong to the AECEO is unfair - however since it is next to impossible to unionize ECE at an employer level because employers do not have the deep collective tax payer pockets of the government that public education system has the reality is that nothing is ever going to change with us being so isolated as a 'collective' so belonging to the AECEO is the only real option for getting a 'collective voice'. The IMO the $60 membership fee would be much CHEAPER than dues you'd pay to a union if you did manage to unionize your centre at an employer level and they union still would not be able to do much to actually make financial changes to wages / paid pd and other financial challenges we face anyway! Nothing is going to change much with our wages until such a time that there is a true 'universal childcare' system that works the same as public education does where the 'government' is our collective employer - and I honestly do not see us achieving TRUE universal childcare in my lifetime because we just do not have the societal value in early childhood education that is needed and it will remain unlikely until the field itself raises the professionalism bar considerably by making 'learning visible and valued' in our programs both for the children AND for ourselves!

Be the change we want to see!

Margaret

Live Well, Laugh Often, Love Much

Be Totallyawake4-life

Lovely Day Paper Pumpkin Scrapbook Edition

Lovely Day Paper Pumpkin Scrapbook edition! 

Using up all the pieces including dissecting the lined envelopes! Paired with the Poppy Moments stamp set for my sentiment titles and Painted Poppy stamp set image along the bottom!

As always I need to print so photos to fit my mats ... one day I might have to spend a crop doing JUST that!

Happy Stampin'

Margaret

Live Well, Laugh Often, Love Much

Be Totallyawake4-life

*this post contains affiliate links 

Scrapbook Nerd Challenge

For this weeks Scrapbook Nerd and Friends challenge I created this card! 

This card challenge gave me a chance to play with the Vicki Boutin Texture Paste, her colour kaleidoscope- Botanical Stencil 3 pack and combined with her Wildflower & Honey - Mingle DSP which are available on the Scrapbook Nerd website! 

These 12x 12 mingle pages are awesome for both scrapbooking as well as cardmaking! One piece of designer series paper can bring you 6 or more focal points for your projects!

 For this card I cut the 4 x6 heart section out and than cut it down to 3x4 size to make 2 little heart focal points for the card. They are mounted on a blue cardstock to form a frame for them.

I than used the stencil on vanilla cardstock with the Vicki Boutin textured paste. Scoop and spread a thin layer with a palette tool. Let dry before assembling your project. 

For my sentiment I paired it with the Joy die from the Concord and 9th Joyful Tiles bundle cut out in red foil cardstock.

Perfect quick and simple less than 10 minute card for you letting your loved one know they bring you joy this Valentines Day!

 

Happy Stampin'

Margaret
Live Well, Laugh Often, Love Much
Be Totallyawake4-life

*this post contains affiliate links 

Lovely Day Paper Pumpkin - outside the box!

Having a blast playing outside the box with the Lovely Day Paper Pumpkin kit for February! This kit's stunning color palette and imagery just brings so many ideas to my mind for alternatives and  love the sentiments in it as well! 

My first alternative I  stuck with the supplies from the kit, aside from the In Color Faceted Dots in the coordinating Pretty Peacock.

Card two today used up the trimming from the Lovely Day kit and paired with the sentiment from the Happy Birthday Stamp set and the Thoughtful Blooms and coordinating punch FREE in Saleabration catty with a qualifying order.

This card uses the Happy Birthday cake image with the die cut of just the floral image using the coordinating Happy Birthday die and colored with the Pool Party and Granny Apple Green blends.

This card used a portion of the card base from the kit and an floral embellishment with some gold twine from my kit and the sentiment in old olive from the Peaceful Moments stamp set.

My last card for today used the card base of a card, the floral image and a sentiment from the kit ... colored with Pool Party blends and with a bit of silver twine and some pearls for this cute Congratulations card.

If you are not already a Paper Pumpkin subscriber you do not want to miss out on March's Kit .... Paper Pumpkin turns 7 years old and they are celebrating with an amazing card kit with an EXTRA free exclusive stamp set in addition to the one that normally comes with the kit!  

 Plus do not forget that if you subscribe to Paper Pumpkin through me as your demo you are invited to join me at the end of each month to play with out kits with some of the alternative ideas! Also if you are NOT a subscriber and would like to check out what Paper Pumkpin is all about just RSVP before the 10th of the Month and I can add an extra kit to my order for you to play with at the class! Details on my website under events!

Happy Stampin'

Margaret
Live Well, Laugh Often, Love Much
Be Totallyawake4-life

*this post contains affiliate links

Queen of Hearts CASO Crop fun!

 Had an amazing time today at the Queen of Hearts Crops fundraiser for CASO station!

As a vendor I had a lovely place to set up my goodies to showcase Stampin' Up! As well as a second table from which to 'destash ' some of my retired product that was looking for a new home to be loved in to make room for some newer product for me to play with!

 My $5 Blow Out sale table was a huge hit - between the selling off of retired merchandise, scrapbook kit sales and orders I was able to donate 10% from those sales and helped to raise an additional $63.00 for the CASO station!

In the Welcome bags I sponsored I had played a little contest game with the croppers that the first 3 people to bring up a complete project showcasing a few of the retired items I had shared in their package would win a prize!  

Jas was the first completed page - and she won our lovely Honey Bee DSP from the Sale-abration catalog.

 Our next winner, if my aging memory serves, was Connie and she won the Lily Pads DSP

The final entry from Anne offered the first double layout option and so she was awarded the Lady Bug Hostess set for her entry plus she even used her pillow box, ribbon and tag from the welcome kit! 

We also had two close contenders hot on the first threes tail with a card entry and a lovely single page layout!  My apologies I did not write down your names and now I am drawing a blank - however they were both lovely uses of the welcome kits contents!

Part of the festivities included Make N Take classes ... I introduced the croppers to the benefits of the card kits from Stampin' Up! 

 

The Lots of Happy Card kit is a great kit for both new and avid stamps a like! Comes with 5 card designs and enough materials to make 4 of each card design. Or you can dissect your kit as I did and use some of the materials to make scrapbook layouts or alternative projects!

 

All 24 slots for the make n take were snatched up which made my heart so very happy! Everyone had lots of fun colouring the floral imagery! Water colouring with pencils and our blender pens is so relaxing! Stampin' and putting together the cards were a nice quick and simple process and I loved how some of the ladies were able to think outside the box and create cards with their own flare!

To add to the fun of the event I had hidden a 'winner' ticket inside the catalog in the Welcome kits and congrats to the lovely Heather for being the first and only person to find a winner ticket ... we ended up drawing names for the other two since no one had come forward to claim them!

 For those out of town who were wanting to create an online order to support the fundraiser please shop my online store www.totallyawake4.stampinup.net and use the following hostess code below before February 29th. Thank you

Thanks for a great day to all!

Margaret
Live Well, Laugh Often, Love Much
Be Totallyawake4-life.com

*post contains affiliate links