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From snowflakes, to bunnies to BIRTHDAY'S!!! My lovely mom is celebrating her 80th on Saturday. We are getting her some fancy pearls because she loves jewelry and to go with them I asked friends and family to share some of mom's "pearls of wisdom" with us. I printed them on some fancy paper and placed them in a beautiful mother of pearl jewelry box! I attached the quote "Real friendship, like real poetry, is extremely rare- and precious as a pearl!"  She has requested a small family picnic at their lake house for her special day, but we are hoping to surprise with a few special gifts and memories as well.

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I picked up all of these fun wrapping papers on a recent trip to Michael's! They are small rolls which I actually find easier to wrap presents with and they only cost $1.50. I used them to wrap gifts for some upcoming parties. I used ribbon for the top gift, but thought some washi tape would be fun for the bottom one. I love the versatility of the paper with different color and pattern combinations.

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I haven't made a beach bucket themed gift in quite a while. It's been a very long winter! So, when one of my friends had a little baby boy, I knew I wanted to make one for her. I found a navy beach bucket and used vinyl letters that I bought at Staples for the babies monogram. I tucked in an adorable monogramed beach towel some tiny sunglasses, flip flops and a hat. This was a fun gift to put together for a family that loves to spend time on the beach at the Cape.

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As my children grow older, I am becoming much more aware of all of their "stuff." Recently, my daughter was invited to a birthday party for a dear friend, who also happens to be one of four children in her family. When I asked her mom about a gift, she suggested a special day out for the girls. I thought this was brilliant, a gift of making memories. After brainstorming with my daughter she decided she wanted a "girls day out" with her friend, that included getting their nails painted and having lunch at a restaurant. So, on her friends birthday, we gave her a little menu where she was able to make some choices: like whether she wanted her nails OR toes painted, what she would like to have for lunch, her favorite kind of chocolate truffle, etc. I put the menu in a little envelope and taped on a tiny pencil for her to use. I also included a tiny bottle of nail polish and a mini chocolate truffle lip-gloss.  I attached a mini whisk to the outside and wrote "whisking you a very happy birthday!"  We went with a cooking theme since that was the theme for her friends birthday party the following weekend.
Our day out was a lot of fun! After nails the girls got to choose one chocolate truffle at Godiva. Then they rode the escalator and sampled perfumes at Nordstrom's and finally had bagels for lunch. I took lots of photos throughout our special day and put them into an album which we gave her friend at her birthday party. It was a fun gift and now my daughter is thinking that she would like something similar for her own birthday in April.

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I am thinking I may have posted something similar to this before, but my favorite gift for a winter baby is a copy of "The Hat" and a new winter hat. I put this one in a berry basket filled with natural straw and used a similar color rope/ribbon. A little gift to tell the new baby that we are excited for their winter arrival!

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We always exchange Valentines with some friends who recently moved away. A little love to let them know we miss them. This year I went with a mustache theme. The card on the lid reads: "I mustache you a question, will you me my valentine?" I found mustache pajamas, ice cube molds, cupcake toppers, straws, even a lip-gloss! It was fun searching for all of these items and sending them off to our dear friends.
My children went back to school today. We had a busy and fun long weekend filled with sleepovers, three birthday parties, play dates, dentist appointments, a dinner date with my husband and a valentine adventure with the kids. I must admit that after 6 full days with everyone home I am relishing a quiet house while my little one naps.  I will share pictures from our Valentines Day later in the week. It's raining and I am about to curl up with a cup of tea and a book.

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My dear friend who hosted the "mad about plaid" party, happened to celebrate her birthday the day before! When I ran into the package store to grab her a bottle of wine, I found wine in a box shaped like a purse! It made me laugh and I grabbed it for the birthday girl. I used the colors from the wine box (red, black and gold) as the inspiration for wrapping the rest of her gifts and also added some plaid ribbon. I arranged some flowers in a vase, bought a mini dessert for her to enjoy, and popped a gift into a glittered gift bag. I love how it all came together in the end and I hope that she had a fabulous birthday.

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 A fun gift for a friend who celebrates a winter birthday is to fill a mug with some cozy gloves and a hat! I placed the mittens/hat in the mug and wrapped it a in some cellophane and attached some fun ribbon and a craft paper tag. We got some snow here in Ct. last night! The kids had an early dismissal yesterday and a two hour delay this morning. I love when it snows. Hope you all have a cozy day.

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I have gotten a lot of action on my blog from people searching for teacher gifts. As a former teacher, I always thought it was nice to get a group gift from a class and so I often find myself organizing them for my children's teachers. This is the present that we are giving my daughter's teacher on Friday. One of her hobbies is cooking and she always does cooking activities with the children at school.  I ordered the book "Christmas Cookies, Bite Size Holiday Lessons" and found an adorable cookie jar to go with it. The class donated money towards a gift certificate to Sur La Table where she can find all sorts of fun cooking utensils or even sign up to take a cooking class! Another parent offered to make a personalized apron for the teacher and red and green fortune cookies with personalized fortunes from the students! The apron, gift certificate and cookies are inside the cookie jar.  This would also be cute if each family wrote down their favorite cookie recipe to stick inside the cookie jar.  I wrapped the book in paper and the whole thing in cellophane and will present it to the my daughters teacher on Friday to let her know how sweet we all think she is.

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This was the gift we gave to the children's teachers. The note read "we are nuts about you!" Inside the take out box was a chocolate acorn. I attached a glass acorn ornament to the outside with twine. This is a wonderful time of year to let teachers know how thankful you are for all they do.

 

 

 

I am hosting my family here tomorrow so I'm spending this rainy day finishing the food prep and  last touches for the table.  One included spray painting some pumpkins we had left over from Halloween with gold spray paint. It could not have been easier and I love how they turned out!

 

 

Thanks so much for stopping by and for all of your kind comments this past year. I am so thankful for the people I have met through this blog and continue to be inspired by so many that I follow.  Happy Thanksgiving to you all!

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Have you started your Christmas shopping yet? Are you trying to check something off your list? I thought I would share the class gift that I have organized for my son's Kindergarten teacher.  My first plan was to purchase an advent calendar and then fill the boxes with Christmas wishes and some gift certificates from all of the students in her class, but the advent calendar arrived damaged and the boxes were tiny and would not hold much of anything. So, plan b was that I decided to make an advent calendar wreath instead! I purchased a fresh green wreath from Lowes for less than $10.  Then I bought some gift certificate boxes that look like tiny presents and attached them to some clothespins with my glue gun. I numbered them and attached them to the wreath. I also sent home tiny white cards and envelopes that the children are writing their Christmas wishes on. I will number them and attach them to the wreath in between all of the boxes. We are going to put some gift cards/other small gifts in the boxes and then give it to her when they start back at school after Thanksgiving vacation.  I even bought a command hook so that she can hang it on her classroom door or on a wall/chalkboard. I think the students will enjoy having her open the envelopes every day and hear the wishes that they have written for her. I tried to make the gift boxes on weekend days or vacation days so that the envelopes and wishes could be read out loud during the day. The parents in my son's class were appreciative that I organized a class gift AND that we can check it off our list before December has even rolled around. Win, win.  I will try to take a photo of the finished product when its done.

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Saturday was the last day of the soccer season for my son. There was a little party afterwards and I was asked to bring cupcakes.  I made mini ones for the kids and a normal sized one for the coach. I used a grass tip and homemade green frosting and placed a sugar soccer ball on top. I packaged the cupcake for the coach in a cellophane cupcake bag and tied it with some twine. The kate spade notecard said: "Small card. Big thank you."  I tucked a gift certificate inside for Dunkin' Donuts.  Just a little token of our appreciation for his willingness to volunteer every Saturday morning and for making soccer a wonderful experience for our son.

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It's official. I'm obsessed with chevron! To me it's like the new polka dot. I found both of these rolls of wrapping paper at Marshalls! They often have a great selection and are always reasonably priced.
These were the two gifts I wrapped this weekend. The top gift was for a friend. I used a navy velvet ribbon and a Martha Stewart label to tie everything together. The bottom gift was for two sisters sharing a  birthday party. We got them rainbow looms,  (I found them at Michael's for $17) which are all the rage right now.  We included an organizer for all of the rubber bands and an extra set of multi colored bands. 

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Hope everyone had a great long weekend! We went to the pumpkin patch twice, had three different parties to attend, hosted Sunday supper for my family and took a trip to see the wee faerie village.
On Tuesday I felt like I needed another weekend just to recuperate.  One of the parties that we attended was a tenth wedding anniversary combined with a two year old birthday. They called it a 10 and 2 party! Since my go to gift for a tenth wedding anniversary is a copy of The Wizard of Oz, I bought them the 75th celebratory edition. I also tucked in some ruby slippers as a gift for the two year old celebrating her birthday. I put them in a tin bucket and wrapped it all in cellophane and tied it up with a beautiful red bow.

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We got boo-ed last week! It was so much fun for the kids and my friend gave me the great idea of booing someone that we don't know. I have to get some items together so we can continue the tradition. In, the meantime I did make a Halloween basket for a friend that needed a little pick me up.  I included some wine and treats (homemade and store bought) and tucked in some paper plates and napkins so that no dishes would need to be done in order to enjoy it.

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Last weekend we celebrated a friends birthday.  She loves martinis and different flavors of vodka so I gave her a set of stemless martini glasses.  Since it also happened to be the fair weekend I found some County Fair Cotton Candy vodka!  I brought some along with a bag of cotton candy (for the garnish) that I picked up right at the fair.  I put the glasses in a striped box and tied it with some ribbon, that was printed with olives!

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Hope everyone is off to a great school year.  It has definitely taken some adjusting to having two in full time school with two lunches to make, homework, parents night, field trips, and extra curricular activities!  I feel like we are finally getting into a routine.
I often get asked for gift ideas for girls, especially from mom's of little boys!  I always tell them you can't go wrong with crafts.  I also love to give books to girls and boys and often pick a theme just around them!  This was for a little girl who turned seven.  We gave her a copy of the book "Crafty Chloe" and then included a doodle book, some crayons/crayon holder, and an oversized chipboard letter to decorate.  This book would also be perfect to go with a handmade gift for the recipient.

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This was a gift I gave to my sister in law for her birthday this past weekend.  The main gift was a gift certificate to StubHub.  I didn't even know that you could get gift certificates from StubHub until a friend gave me the idea last weekend.  This allows the recipient to choose tickets to a play, concert, or comedy show.  Since my sister in law lives near New York City I put the gift certificate in an apple shaped gift bag.  I also tucked in some stickers and an Essie nail polish called "wicked" as a nod to the musical.  My sister in law loved this gift and thought it was a great idea and something that she would copy in the future.  Hopefully you will think so too!

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Today is officially our last day of summer and I am running around trying to get everything ready for our back to school dinner!  I will share pictures from our back to school activities and dinner soon.  For today, I wanted to share the gift I just dropped off at some friends house to welcome their new baby girl.  When I had my third baby, thanks to the kindness of friends, I didn't have to cook for the first few weeks!  It was such a luxury.  If you know someone who just had a baby, make them dinner, they will love you for it.  Of course, I wanted to get them some gifts to go with dinner so I ordered an LL Bean bag (our go to gift) embroidered with the baby's name on it.  I also gave them a beautiful ribbon photo album and some stickers that you can put on the babies onesie and photograph them throughout their first year.  There are many different options and colors available on etsy. For the big sister in the family I gave her some of these adorable tiny books to "read" to her new baby sister. 

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This is a fun gift for anyone on your list.  My daughter LOVES ice cream and is always drawing pictures of ice cream cones. I loved the one that she drew above so I took it to Staples and they were able to turn it into postcards!  They were having a deal where I was able to get 100 for $20. At then end of the school year we wrapped up some to give to her teacher and for her first grade buddy.  We also used one with a gift certificate to cold stone creamery attached for the bus driver!  I still have plenty on hand to use attached to gifts or for her to use as thank you gifts. I love this gift because it is personal and useful.