Teacher Appreciation gift idea

I promised that I'd be back to show you a fun teacher appreciation gift idea, so here I am.  Ta-da!  After homeschooling my kiddos for three years, I have gained an all new appreciation for the men and women who educate our little people.  Especially in light of expanding class sizes.  I can't imagine how on earth they do it.  Our family was incredibly blessed with two completely amazing teachers this year, and I have no doubt that they were specially placed right in the story of my hoodlums little lives, by a very good God who loves them.  And because of that, I wanted to love on them a little bit with an extra sweet gift which pales in comparison to the gift that they have given not only my kiddos this year, but also myself and our family.

 First, let's talk about monograms.  I adore them.  Adore, people!  I had a brilliant idea in the middle of the night.  Because let's face it, that's when brilliant ideas strike.  Or in the shower.  But you can't really tell people that because then they think you're thinking about them in the shower, and that's just creepy no matter how you try and say it.  Ha!

 Here's what I did.  Do you remember this post, where I took clay and made garden markers?  (Which are also holding up amazingly in our near constant rain by the way, for those of you who have asked.)  I printed out some letters in the size and font I wanted, and then rolled out my clay, about 1/4" thick.  I placed the printed letter on top and lightly traced the outline with a dull knife, just enough to press the outline into the clay.  After that I removed the paper and cut out the letter with a knife.  I baked it according to the instructions on the box, and after it was cooled, I painted it aqua!

 I dragged Nurse Nicki to a nearby antique mall and we scoured the place for some great, beat up old buckets.

 And then the fun part!  Filling them.  I toyed with doing a dinner in a bucket, but for some reason I ended up wanting to do breakfast instead.  I love breakfast...  I found some aqua colored, acrylic canisters and filled them with granola, and tucked some milk in next to them. (Don't be jealous of our local dairy that still makes milk in darling glass bottles.  I know... they're adorable.) I grabbed some bagels and wrapped them in brown paper, and added some laughing cow strawberry cream cheese wedges, and some yummy jam.  Lastly I added in a coffee drink and some daisies, cut fresh from my garden. My kiddos wrote the sweetest notes to their teachers too, which went in at the last second along with one of these turquoise VW bus postcards with a little note of appreciation from our family, jotted down on the backside.  Ava wrote a poem that was hysterical.  Oh that girl... 

 After everything was wrapped and arranged inside these great buckets, I felt all tingly.  I adore giving gifts like this. Some of my most memorable gifts, have been a collection of items in a basket or container.  It's like opening a treasure hunt!  I figured the teachers could use the buckets later for planters, or whatever.  You can't ever have too many old beat up buckets, right?

I found the canisters at TJ Maxx.  Twine can be purchased here (and thanks to a reader for this link).  I buy my brown paper at Sherwin Williams.  It's thinner than packing paper, and comes on big rolls in various widths and I prefer the 18 inch rolls.  It's one of my favorite things and I wrap most of my Etsy items in it before shipping them out. 

Do you have any great teacher gift ideas that you can share with us?  I'm always on the lookout for a great gift idea!