First Post! I've never been good at titles....

November and December have been very busy - crafty months for me.  I've been making so many different things I decided to start writing things down - so I don't duplicate things for next year!  This year for teacher gifts I made adjustable aprons, homemade hot fudge, snowman soup and included a cookbook my mom's group put together a couple of years ago.  I was pleased with how the aprons turned out.  I followed this tutorial:  http://www.instructables.com/id/How-to-sew-an-adjustable-chefs-apron/ .

The snowman soup turned out great too!  I  used ingredients from our local farm market/bulk foods store to make these -- and purchased the 12 inch cones from Joanns.com.  I used 2 bags for each - one for the hot chocolate - rubberband the top and cut off the extra before adding the mini chocolate chips and mini marshmallows.  Double bagging it keeps the chocolate chips from sinking into the hot chocolate mix.  In addition to making these for both teachers, the principal, and secretaries - I made them for all the kids in each of my kids classes.  They turned out so cute!   Candy cane was added for stirring!

Unfortunately I didn't take pictures of the little jars of hot fudge sauce. 

I was the room parent for my son's 3rd grade class - so I was in charge of planning the winter party.  Our theme was the Arctic - we had an Arctic fishing game - where the kids went "fishing" and had to answer questions correctly to win a prize - we played "winter wind" where the kids lined up on each side of the table and had to keep a couple of ping pong balls from rolling off the table by blowing them back and forth. 

For our craft I found great snowflake fleece at Joanns and decided to make scarves for the kids.  I made the girls green and cream and the boys brown and blue - both with snow flakes on the fleece.  I was afraid if they wore them to school they would get them mixed up - so I appliqued their names on each one.  I cut out 4 inch letters with my Cricut - then cut the names out of fleece...and sewed them on using a small zig zag stitch.  The kids part of the craft was to put beads on the fringes (I had previously fringed each scarf).  They had the choice of using pony beads that changed colors when they went outside or using blue pony beads - then they tied a knot after each bead.  It was a big hit!

For our snack I made them each a bag with pretzel rods dipped in chocolate and covered with sprinkles, cake balls ( http://www.bakerella.com/category/pops-bites/cake-balls/ ), peppermint meringues      ( http://allrecipes.com//Recipe/peppermint-meringues/Detail.aspx ), and pretzel rounds.  So yummy!

In their goodie bags in addition to the snowman soup, I also made each one a tic tac toe game - using arctic animals made out of shrinky dink - instead of x's and o's.  They turned out great!  I love shrinky dink!  I made 20 different animals  - 10 of each - so there weren't many duplicates.

Every year I tell myself not to put so much time into the kids school parties - and every year it doesn't work out for me.  The kids only have one party at school each year...and I want them to be able to take something away from it - I want them to have fun.  Oh well, another  year done!