Calling all teachers......

[stampinswampysue]

At the party I hosted, I invited a friend who is not into stamping (what!?) and she originally turned down the invite. Then I suggested the Teacher Time set as a Christmas gift for her daughters' teachers. She still didn't want to spend that much, so I suggested she break the set in 2 and put a pad with each. She said it was a big hit.

[kimmiller]

Just to see what you think. We decided to collect the gift items and $ collection and do the gift baskets as a whole. This was in hopes of no one child feeling like they weren't able to give and were left out. So each teacher will get one basket filled with lots of things. I am sure I will use many of the suggestions here. At Christmas we just collected money as a Middle School (the parents loved the idea) and divided it between the staff/faculty. Each one got a gift certicate to our local mall. They all seemed very over whelmed! The parents loved not having to come up with something for each of the teachers their student had in middle school. Just another idea!

Kim

P.S. Thanks Britta! Great suggestions!

[StampinMelis]

Helping in the classroom is a great idea. How about a homemade coupon book? "Good for 1 hour of making copies." "Good for 1 hour of grading papers." "Good for 1 hour of work (your choice!)."

I would LOVE that!

[rachelbenj]

I can only give my opinion, but for what it is worth here it is.

I was a teacher until I decided to stay home when I had my first baby. I was always appreciative of everything that I was given. I thought that it was great that the families went to the time and expense to do something nice for me.

I would say no more MUGS, no more CANDLES, no more BATH and BODY products, and absolutely no more FIGURINES. One can only have so many mugs, some people like me don't care for candles or are allergic to the different scents. Some people don't care for bath and body stuff (like me). I think that I (and others) have a slight allergy to the different scents. More figurines means more dusting. With that said, if you know for sure that the teacher loves one of the ideas listed above then by all means go ahead (for instance if you know that someone loves Party Lite).

My favorite things to receive as a teacher were notes of appreciation. Nothing can top the feeling of being appreciated. After all, a teacher spends more time in the presence of a child than most parents, and it is nice to know that the parents recognize the importance of you in their child's life. As far as material things go, I would shoot for gift certificates (favorite restaurant, teacher supply store, mall, etc). I happened to like getting ornaments. I never took them home because my tree has a theme, but I would put all of the ornaments that I collected over the years on a tree in my classroom every year (of course I had the child's name and year on it somewhere).

[CaroleAnneP]

At a SU Demo's class the other day I saw this cute note pad cover with pencil attached and a 3 x 5 note book in it. She had written a note on the front page to the teachers. It was so cute.

Last year I made stationery sets for each of my children's two main teachers using Roses in Winter with paper, envelopes and cards to match and a parchment envelope to hold everything, it looked lovely. For the support (can't ever forget them) staff my SU Deomonstrator showed me a cute envelope turned into a gift card holder so I put a gift card in for Jamba Juice. This year I'd like to stamp those memo cubes and put a pen with them...now to figure out how y'all do it. I'm also a quilter so I've made small quilted bags, memo boards with cute kids fabrics and SU thank you cards in a home made box.

Christmas I try to do a gift basket, I find dollar store Christmas baskets and tins and fill them with some cookies and then add other things to the basket and pull it together with plastic wrap. I have a friend who is a demonstrator for Tastefully Simple Gourmet products and I was able to fill baskets with tasty goodies for under $20.00 each.

Someone last Christmas suggested a collection and we gave the teachers gift certificates for Lakeshore Learning.

Since my son is leaving his Montessori pre-school and going to kindergarten this year I'd love to initiate a collection and maybe get his teachers a lovely engraved pen.

A Quilter and Stamper in California

[veramats]

I'm a former teacher (middle school) and the items I still have are hand-written notes from students. I also have a few pictures from those years. They remind me of the rewarding part of teaching.

I have taught dance (my mom owns a studio) and public middle school, and do not really like edible items or anything decor for my home. I received so many little ballerinas over the years and I just had to goodwill them. I hated doing it, but I had boxes and boxes of them.

Also, bath and body items can be risky because you never know if someone has an allergy.

Great ideas are gift certificates to Target, a Simon gift card is great--it works like a VISA, book store gift certificate, or movies.

I like the theme gift, too. Just make it universal like popcorn, blockbuster GC and other related items.

I think a mini album with pics of the kids would be great, too.

Vera

[Smay819]

I'm not a teacher but wanted to share what we got our teacher this year for my son's kindergarten class. I was the room parent.

We had each child draw (at home) a picture of what they most liked about the class the past year and write a little bit about it. Parents were asked to also donate $$ for a gift.

The pictures were arranged in a scrapbook and we also got her a gift certificate to a restaurant, a gift certificate to a book store and a beautiful hanging plant of impatiens. She seemed to really enjoy it!

Personally....I love when I get gift certificates so I assume others do too!

Oh...a few years ago I gave my other son's teacher a beach tote filled with beach gear, sunscreen, aloe, flip flops, a small pedicure kit, nail polish, gift certificate to a book store. She loved that!