Fresh Picked: Teacher Gifts

My sister sent me a super cute idea for Teacher Gifts.  They were easy and inexpensive, which was perfect because I needed four altogether and had little time to prepare them.

First, I made some fruit themed card sets: 

Next, I picked up some "Fresh Picked" Soap from Bath & Body Works.  I got them on sale for $3.00 each:

Saved some strawberry baskets from berries we bought recently:

Then I printed these tags and made them into cards:

Nathan's message to his teacher:

Added some cellophane wrap and ribbon and they're all done:

Total Cost: $3.00 each (plus wrapping / card supplies which I already had on hand)  

Who needs Pinterest when I have my sisters!?  Thanks, Jordana :)

Fall Treat Bags & Gogo's

Here are the teacher treat bags we made for Halloween this year for school teachers, piano teacher, visiting teachers, and a few other special people.


I packaged them up early because that way the candy is stapled inside and prevents them from being eaten before Halloween.

The candy in the jars was used to make up some other treat bags, as well as for some Halloween activities. I still have the two jars of candy corn on the counter as nobody likes to eat candy corn at our house. That's why it makes great Halloween decorations.

Here's a close up of the bag toppers, which I created in Word and printed onto cardstock. The bags are in the craft section of Dollarama. You get 50 bags for a dollar.


These are super easy and quick, but if you want to make them without a computer you can do that too:


The little creatures in the bags are called Gogo's or Gogo's Crazy Bones. They are all the rage right now and impossible to find in any stores, apparently. I bought the last couple of bags at Toys R Us one night, not knowing they were such a hot commodity. Maybe I should have sold them on Kijiji instead of giving them to the kids for Thanksgiving.

Project Life 2010

I decided to start something this year called Project Life.

If you are familiar with Becky Higgins, you might already know what Project Life is all about.

But before I get a head of myself, let's back up a bit.

Almost 10 years ago, after Samantha was born, I found a new hobby... scrapbooking.

I spent the next two years scrapbooking every cute picture of Samantha in beautiful handcrafted albums.  I loved having this new creative outlet and spent a lot of time (and money) on scrapbooking and scrapbook supplies. 

By the end of 2003 our family was growing, Scott was done school, and we had a demanding start-up business in the works.  I found that caring for three children ages 3 and under was keeping me a little too busy for scrapbooking.

I wanted to keep it up, but just couldn't find the time.  But I didn't want to give up paper crafting all together. So when a friend of mine introduced me to stamping, I found a happy medium, in the form of card-making.

Card-making was less time consuming than scrapbooking, and fulfilled that creative outlet.  I decided to go with it.

Fast forward to January 2010.  Babies number four and five have joined our family and life is just keeping us too busy with work, church callings, and new home planning.  Sadly, my card-making has gone the way of the scrapbooks.

Yes, I can still whip up a simple birthday card when needed, or some homemade valentines or other small projects, but it just isn't the hobby it once was. 

The worst part, though, is that our bookshelves are looking a little too skimpy in the photo album department.  I just have never managed to keep on top of printing our digital pictures and getting them into albums.

And that was unacceptable to me.  That, alone, was reason enough to try this new project. 

So... for $39.00 (US) plus shipping, I plan to "scrapbook" a complete album of family pictures, including journaling, for the entire year.  One picture a day, every day for the year.

I'll let you know how it goes!

Halloween Treats

I made these Halloween Treat Bags for the kids to give to their teachers tomorrow. They are filled with chocolate chip cookies that were baked in mini muffin tins and decorated with Halloween sprinkles. I used Alton Brown's Recipe, "The Chewy". We have made them a few times now and they really are chewy and so good!

The pumpkin suckers are treats for Samantha's classmates. Brett's class takes turns bringing things in (and he's off the hook until February), and Jesse didn't need treats either, so we only did 20. Samantha helped and I think it took us about 5 minutes to do it together. I can't justify spending more time than that on something that will be sitting in the bottom of a trash can in less than 24 hours.

All the kids are wearing orange and black to school tomorrow - that seems to be the new "thing" for Halloween at school these days. When I was little we always wore costumes to school on Halloween, but I have to say that as a Mom, I'm quite happy to send the kids off in black and orange clothes instead. I will try to remember to take pictures before school, but since that's typically the most hectic time of day around here, we'll see how it goes.

Teacher Gifts and Birthday Invites

I've been doing a little stamping lately - something that I love, but really don't have much time for these days. But with Brett's birthday coming up, I needed some invitations to his "Diggin' Dinosaur Party" that we're having at the Children's Museum. These had to be quick and easy because I totally left them to the last minute!


I started making card sets for end-of-the-year teacher gifts for our kids' school teachers a couple of years ago when Samantha started school. This is the set I made this year. I made both sets the same so I could mass produce 2 sets, 8 cards in each. This was a fun project. But talk about leaving things to the last minute... I was finishing them this morning before school!

Catching Up

Thursday night I went to a baby shower for our friends that had a baby boy. Now, I'm not that old, but it sure makes me feel old when kids that I used to baby-sit get married and have babies of their own! This was my first time meeting Sasha, Michael's wife, and their baby Karson is so sweet! Jesse helped me pick out some baby clothes at Old Navy, and all of the clothes had cute little green alligators on them. He even picked out a little stuffed alligator / baby rattle. This is the card I made to go along with the gift.


Friday morning I dropped off Brett and Jesse at a friend's house so that Nathan and I could volunteer at Samantha's end of the year field trip to the Children's Festival. There were tons of games, crafts, and fun activities and booths. Samantha never passes up a chance to get her face painted! It's been one of her favourite things since she was old enough to walk. Samantha and her friend Kayley made lots of crafts, including a mask, a kite, a clothespin hand, and a fun-foam flower. They also won some prizes and got to watch a musical performance at Museum London (en francais).


Friday night we travelled to Kingsville for Scott's cousin's Wedding Reception. Heidi made a beautiful bride, and it was a wonderful evening filled with great company, delicious food, and lot's of dancing.

With soccer pictures, a Primary Activity, a friend's birthday dinner, and Samantha singing in church on Sunday - the rest of the weekend flew by. Now we are getting ready for our Play On! Tournament this weekend in Halifax. Hopefully I can squeeze in a few of posts here and there. Thanks for those of you that have subscribed to my blog. I'm enjoying this blogging hobby, as it's kind of an outlet for me as well as an online journal for our family. The fact that some people actually want to read it is totally a bonus. So, thanks!