Whisking everyone a merry Kissmas

I want to share with you the gift I gave both our neighbors and our church's Sunday School department teachers and aids.

I found this adorable idea on Pinterest, of course. 

(feel free to follow me on Pinterest by clicking on the button on my sidebar ----->) 

Its was created by a wonderful blog called making memories with your kids.

I LOVED the idea and quickly set to work gathering all the supplies to make SEVERAL of these....ummm I'm talking my kids and I whipped out roughly 23.  I gave them to all our Sunday School Teachers & Aids, and I made a different tag to give to all our neighbors.

I started the project by having my 6yr old help me stuff the whisks with kisses.

A word of advice this only works well with the small and medium sized whisks, but they fall out of the large whisk so you will need to take a handful, wrap them in plastic wrap, and then insert them into the large whisk.  Also be aware that not all of the kisses in the bag will make it into the whisks.  Somehow they make it into the helpers mouths, of course that's all part of the fun.

Next I took some red packaging ribbon.

And attached my tag to the loop at the top of the whisk.

This particular tag was the one made for our Neighbor gifts.  The tags made for the Sunday School teachers were different and more of a "Thank You" for all their hard work.  The tags can be made anyway you like to fit the recipient or you can use the printable I have included.

Here's a generic printable tag for you to use should you decide to do this next year

I printed mine in 3x5 inch tags, but you can configure yours to make any size you like.  

I hope you like this idea as much as I did, and as much as all the recipients did as well!

Have a great day and God Bless!

Oh Christmas Tree Shirt, Oh Christmas Tree Shirt How Lovely Are Your Branches

Recently my Girls did a really fun craft at school.  It was a Hand Print Christmas Tree Shirt. They turned out so cute and since I was there for most of the creative process I thought I would share their beautiful results and the process so you can make one of your own.

First take a shirt or sweatshirt and insert a piece of cardboard inside of it so that the paint wont bleed through to the other side.

Next paint the children's hands completely green 

(this is Macey's wonderful Kindergarten teacher Mrs. Keeton)

(they LOVE this!!)

Next begin slowly and firmly pressing their hands to the shirt with the fingers pointing to the bottom of the shirt and splayed out wide to give a "branch" effect. Alternate hands for the "branches"  to look good on the sides of the tree.

When they are done with this wash all hands, faces, counters, clothes, and anything else they managed to get paint on, and set the shirts to the side to dry.

After the green paint has completely dried use a sponge you have cut into the shape of a star to place a star at the top of the tree.  Or just use ribbon to make a bow and add it to the top in the next step.  whatever your preference.

After they have completely dried (I would give it overnight at the very least) you will start gluing on your decorations of beads, glitter paint, and ribbon.  One suggestion is to use a really strong fabric glue or high temp hot glue simply because you really want these decorations to last through washings and accidental dryings.  Its really not a good idea to put shirts decorated with jewels in the dryer so I suggest hanging to dry, but I know it happens when you are in a rush.

Here is a picture of Macey's finished Hand Print Christmas Tree Shirt

She loves it an so do I!!

I hope you enjoyed seeing this as much as I loved helping and as much as she loves wearing it.  Let me know what kind of shirts you have made with your family this year.  

Have a great day and God Bless!

Peppermint Ornaments and Wreath

Today I went to my oldest daughters school to help her class make peppermint ornaments.  They were so cute and super easy to make.  So I thought I would share them with you as well as my inspiration for a wreath after they were done making their ornaments.

Here is the finished ornament and as you can see it is very cute, but very simple.

First to gather your supplies you will need:

1.) red peppermints, green spearmints, or both

2.) Pipe cleaners

3.) ribbon cut into about 6 inch lengths

4.) red-hots

5.) LOW temp hot glue gun

6.) glue sticks

7.) spray can of clear shellac clear coating

First take five mints of either red or green and arrange into a circle.  Then put a dot of glue between each mint until are all attached together.  

You are looking at the backside of your mint. Now you will take you pipe cleaner and cut of a piece long enough to make a circle large enough to glue to the back of the mint circle with out showing on the other side. Then criss-cross the ends of one of you 6inch long ribbons making a look to hang your ornament by.  The picture below shows what it should look like after both of these steps.

Finally you will glue one red-hot to the center of each mint.

Lastly once all of the glue had dried very firmly you will spray a coat of shellac over the entire mint area. Again here is the picture of the final project.

Each student made one of each color and they are too cute.  When we were finished we had quite a bit of the supplies left over so I decided to get creative (with the teachers permission of course) to make a mint wreath for the classroom.

I started by making a large circle alternating color of mints and gluing them together.

Next I grabbed some long pipe cleaners 

and attached them together on one end.  I didn't not make a circle since I wasn't sure just two would go all the way around the back of the wreath

I started gluing it around the back of the wreath in the center of the mints. .

Then I started another circle of alternating colored mints on the inside of the first circle.  I glued them together and to the outside circle

Then I glued a pipe cleaner around the back of the inner circle of mints

Then for extra stability I took a couple more pipe cleaners and glued them in a zig-zagg pattern between the two circles of pipe cleaners. 

After that dried pretty well I flipped it over and admired my handiwork. I decided that to add red-hots to it after having the alternating colored mints made it too busy looking. It wasn't done since after the teacher sprays it with shellac I am going to wrap a wide red ribbon completely around the top/through the wreath and tie it in a bow to hang bye.  She was going to spray everything down over the weekend so a truly final picture will be posted next week, but I just couldn't wait to share this project since it would be super fun to do with your kids over the weekend if you are looking for such a project.  Until then here is how it turned out minus the shellac and ribbon to hang it by

I cant wait to finish it up on Monday.  

I do have a few pointers for you if you decide to do it yourself.  Low temp hot glue was the only glue that would stick together and dry quickly enough for a children's project without melting/liquefying the candy.  everything else made the red-hot slimy or just didn't stick the mints together.  Also you NEED something on the back for stability and pipe cleaners is just what we came up with.  You can try something else if you like but this did the trick for us.

Overall, it was a fun day spent with my daughter class and was very productive.  I hope you like this simple, quick, and cute project, and if you decide to make it or another variation I would love to see a picture and hear all about it!

Merry Christmas!

Have a great Day and God Bless!

Peachy Teachers

I have seen so many cute teacher appreciation gifts on Pinterest, and I have been planning to do several for my girls teachers.  I just haven't remembered to pick up the supplies.  You know how that is.  You want to get it, you remember in the car on the way, forget to add it to the list, and when you finally get to the store you  forget.  All of a sudden after you are finished unloading the groceries, sitting in the drivers seat, and cranking the car it hits you like a bolt of lighting "Teachers!!!!  AAAARRRGGGHhhhhhhh!!!  Then you promise yourself you will get the stuff the NEXT time you go to the store.  Will the cycle ever be broken?!?!   Why yes it was. As I was dashing through the grocery store I went past the soft drinks, and as I passed the bagged candy a little bag of Peachieos called out to me "STOP!".  So. I. did. As soon as I saw them inspiration struck, and the cutest idea popped into my head for a teacher appreciation gift.  Other than the Peachieos, I had everything I needed at home to complete the simple gift.

So here is what I came up with, and SCORE I made a printable for you guys as well so you too can share the love with your kids teachers.

So yah, this is pretty self explanatory, but I am going to walk through it anyway...

I started with a small $1.29 bag of PeachieO's

Then I grabbed some previously received blue ribbon (don't you just love recycling useful items??) from my gift wrapping closet.

Since I had two gifts to make I used two pieces of ribbon per gift. I took the two pieces and tied them tightly around the bag about one third of the way down.  Then after punching a hole in the top corner of the tag I inserted just one of the ends of the ribbon through the hole.  Then picking up another end of the ribbon that's tied around the bag I tied another knot on top of the tag to secure it to the gift but keeping it still visible.  If I had put both strings on one side through the hole might have A: torn the tag or B: been too much ribbon curliness on top of the tag, and since the tag pretty much makes the whole point of the gift that wouldn't have been too great.

Oh, and I made up the tag as a printable to be included in this post as well (as I so sweetly mentioned in the teaser earlier).  Just right click then choose "save image as", saving it wherever you want to on your computer, and then you can print as many as your heart desires.

You will notice on mine that I actually added our family name at the bottom, but I was sweet enough to leave that off of this one.  Cause hey, if your name isn't Rogers it would be kinda weird for you to give to your teachers..right?  Right! So if you like you can edit this image with any image editing software, even one as simple as paint, and add your name to the bottom to personalize it. 

I hope you enjoyed my simple, on the fly, inspiration for a thrifty teachers gift (a buck twenty nine anyone??).  

Oh did I mention that they loved it?  My eldest daughters teacher actually shared the goodies with her class, but the youngest's teacher savored hers all by herself (smart lady who wants a bunch of sugared up Kindergartners??  not her, or me for that matter!).

If you have any ideas on this type of simple "Thank You" let me hear them.  I am always on the lookout for new ones, and I LOVE your comments!!!

Have a great day & God Bless!!