End of Year Gifts

Yesterday was the last day of school for our kiddos, and today was the last day of work for my assistants and me!

WOOHOO IT'S SUMMER AND I SURVIVED MY FIRST YEAR OF TEACHING!

So to thank my wonderful assistants for all their help this year (seriously, I couldn't have made it through without them) and to say 'farewell' to the kids, I made some little gifts.

For the assistants, I made these beach bags and had all of our students put their handprint on and sign their name.  Now, to do this, I had to figure out how to sneak away all of our students in small groups to a place where my assistants wouldn't find them and the bags could dry out of harm's way.  Ironically, this project would have been a lot easier with some assistance! :)
All I did here was paint each of their hands with fabric paint and stick it on the bag (yes, I got to hear 'That tickles!' 17 times in a row).  I then had the kids write their names under their handprint in pen, and I went over it later with fabric paint.

Later, I added beach towels, a picture of our class, some drinks for the pool, some chocolate, and a gift card.  This would be a great teacher/volunteer/room mom gift!

For the kids, I found this adorable idea on pinterest.  All I did was buy packets of Kool-Aid powder (4 for $1 at the grocery store), add a strip of folder fabric paper to the top, print out a label for the front and a note for the back, hole-punched, and added a crazy straw.  It was super easy, super cheap, and I know the kids loved them.

Finally, we have the end-of-year gift for myself.  Just kidding. I just didn't want to do a whole new post for these babies.

On Monday we had some friends over for some smoked meat, and I whipped up this easy dessert.

No-Bake Nutter Butter Butterfinger Bars from TheDomesticRebel

These bars were super easy to make (I could do it in like 10 minutes as they were putting food on the table).  All I had to do was blend up some nutterbutters, add some melted peanut butter chips, condensed milk, and butterfingers then press it in a pan and add nutterbutters to the top.

WOW. It was an 8x8 pan.  There were 9 pieces. There were 6 people. Each of us had one piece. Then we had to put the other half of our piece back after nobody could finish it.

This dessert was SO rich... it was like eating a massive nutter butter cookie! It was delicious, but I should have cut smaller pieces.

That's it for now. I'm OFFICALLY starting my summer right... now.  So get ready for craft/blog madness.