some teacher gifts

Ah, the end of the year teacher gift. I kind of dread them. There is a lot of pressure to give a thoughtful, meaningful, but not too extravagant gift. I honestly love it when one energetic mom decides to collect money for a group gift from the whole class, but this year, no one stepped forward. I then donate to the energizer mommy and buy a very small gift for my child to give.

I bought this Longaberger basket when they were having a one day only sale (it helps when one of your best friends is a consultant- it was so hard to keep it in my closet and not just adopt it as my own, like the puppies at the pet store! I finally had to put it in a dark box so I could kind of forget about it. Incidentally, I already have this basket for myself, but you know I can hardly resist a good Longaberger!) and I put a whole bunch of pink stuff in there, no reason, I just thought she would like them. (pink stuff: water bottle, sunglasses case, note pad, ankle socks, crossword book, chocolates) Later I covered this with basket cellophane and of course added a beautiful bow but I did not take a picture, oops.

The gym teacher at Zoe's school is a man so I filled a water bottle with kisses instead of the other gifts I made for her lady teachers. The tag (which you cannot see- sorry) is tied to the top with his card.
The lady teachers (music, art, library, bus driver, school nurse- Zoe went to see her a lot) all got these little goodie bags. They had cute matchbook notepads, kisses, and a gift card to our local ice cream shop. I wanted to include pens but I forgot.
I made these little kiss bags to put in the goodie bags. These are tiny jewelry bags with the paper folded over and stapled on top. I love these. I have made these for so many occasions. Valentines treats are perfect in here. Don't you just love this bicycle stamp? It is a way old one from Stampin' Up (so are the word stamps).
Please ignore my unmanicured hand, so not pretty (just FYI I want my hands to look like those ladies on QVC. Don't they just look so pampered and nice?)

I included the ice cream gift cards in everyone's gift. I also wrote personal notes to each teacher which is probably what they like most of all.

I know I am a bit late in posting as some kids have been out of school for a couple weeks. I thought maybe you'd like to file this one away for next year.