2 Simple, Inexpensive, Last Minute, Awesome Teacher Gifts!

This Christmas season I am being so last minute.

For some reason it's super busy this year. Having a big birthday party for Theo last weekend, and two internet writing projects on the go that I have to finish before Christmas. Miss A starting school in the new year means Kindy graduation and lots and lots of parties at school and kindy and family get-togethers and all the little things that need to be done in between, like get my boys a haircut before the school principal tells me they need a haircut!

So tomorrow is the last day of school for my kids (early I know, but that is the downside or upside - depends how you look at it, of private schooling), and I suddenly woke up this morning and realised I hadn't organised teacher's gifts. I had been thinking about it, but just hadn't got around to doing anything about it.

My three older children have all had amazing teachers this year. They had amazing teachers last year too, so we really wanted to find a way to express our appreciation for them.

So I quickly scanned pinterest and came up with two ideas for the two younger kids. Hugh is giving his teacher a gift card, which is the thing to do when you're a teenager. Mum's crafts and baking just won't do anymore!

Both these ideas cost less than $20, and if you have a colour printer, they're cheap, quick and easy to make. I had two hours this morning to make these. Seriously! With a school prize giving/concert on all afternoon I had to churn them out quickly.

I am thrilled with this gift for my 11 year old daughter's amazing teacher.
Miss M came up with these words to describe her teacher herself.

To make this word cloud, all you need to do is go to this fantastic website, Wordle. Type in the words you want to use - we also included the teacher's name, play around with the layouts, fonts and colours (it really is fun), and then just print. So simple. So quick. And I ran down to our local shopping centre and bought a fabulous, but inexpensive frame from Charles and Munro…. one of my most favourite shops, and I won't tell you about these to-die-for red serving plates I also found for the Christmas table. Ssssh!

I can't wait to hear what Mrs. H thinks of her gift. I'm so happy with it.

For Theo, I decided to do something quite different. He has had an old-school teacher this year, and while I had a few misgivings at the beginning of the year, it turns out she was just what he needed. Someone to help keep him focused and organised, and strict enough to pull him back into line when he needed it!

So I bought a plant at the local plant store for $12, and using twine and some scrapbooking paper I have kept for years and years, made a little paper-bunting saying 'thanks' to go across the front. Because the flower stalks are too delicate to tie string around, I got two HB pencils and tied the string onto those as well. Quite fitting for a teacher, don't you think!

Using picmonkey collage and Labels, I made a little cutout with a short message from Theo to his teacher and glued it to a (clean) ice-block stick and stuck it into the flower pot. Easy!

So, there are my two last-minute teacher's gifts, and I'm actually more thrilled with them than I ever have been for any of the gifts I have given in the past where I laboured for hours over tiny Christmas cakes and Cookies in a Jar.

I'd love to hear more ideas for teacher gifts, so tell me what you do! They sure do some great work with our kiddies, and certainly deserve a little praise and thanks, don't they!