Primary Peach Launch Party Freebie: Quick and Easy End of the Year Gift Ideas For Support Staff

Today is the day ---I can finally let the cat out of the bag!!!! I am thrilled to be a part of a BRAND NEW collaborative teaching blog, written exclusively by GEORGIA teacher bloggers!!! This new blog will be packed with tips, tricks, ideas and treats from some of the very best Georgia teachers! Now, without further adieu, I present:



And the news gets even MORE exciting! Our very first post is a BLOG HOP filled with End of the School Year themed FREEBIES!!!! It's hard to believe the school year is almost over. We've got some great goodies to help make your year-end craziness go just little bit smoother----each contributor has created a special Freebie to sweeten our Launch Party!  

I'm Ayn Colsh, a contributing author on the Primary Peach, as the resident Ga. Pre-K teacher. I've been teaching 20+ years, mostly in Pre-K, and and a BIG proponent of play-based, hands-on learning, I've been involved with the Georgia Pre-K program for 9 years now, and I LOVE what I do! Where else can you go to work and dress up, play, have snack, get dirty and have fun every day? Teaching is the BEST profession!  I blog about my adventures as a Georgia Pre-K teacher here on my personal blog, little illuminations, and am also a monthly contributor on the collaborative blog, PreK+K Sharing. I am married with two beautiful daughters, Lyndsay, 24 and Bailey, 17. We share our home with two dogs, Max and Ella.

Be sure to check out the "ABOUT" page on Primary Peach to meet all of our contributors!

Now, for the sweet treat I promised you. There are always the folks that helped my own children in school, and have been essential to my life as a teacher that are often forgotten when the "Thank You" gifts are handed out at the end of the year. The custodians, office staff, bus drivers, Occupational, Physical and Speech Therapists---all those folks who really have a hand in making our days go smoother are often overlooked. Most often, it is just not easy to purchase gifts for everyone we'd like to thank. A few years ago, my daughter started taking in doughnuts for the custodians near the end of the year because she said especially in high school, no one ever thinks to say "thank you" for all they do. I made these cute little gift tags that can be attached to a box of donuts for them this year. You don't have to spend a lot to let someone know that they are appreciated. A kind gesture goes a LONG way! 

You can get my FREEBIE "I 'DONUT' know what I'd do without you!" gift tags here!

Now, for EVEN MORE to sweeten the deal, how would you like to win a TPT gift certificate? We are having a Rafflecopter Giveaway too!!!! One lucky person will win a $50 TPT certificate and 3 more lucky folks will each win a $25 TPT gift certificate!!! You've got to be in it to win it! 

Click here to enter the giveaway!

Ready to meet the next Primary Peach contributor? Click the link below and meet Jennifer from The Extra Energetic Educator. Be sure to keep clicking through to meet all of our fabulous bloggers and get the freebies on each blog!

Meet Jennifer from The Extra Energetic Educator!

Preschool Valentine and Heart Activities and Art

I know that technically yesterday was Valentine's Day, but many in our part of the US have been without power and out of school due to fierce winter storms. Our holiday celebrations have been postponed until later next week. We've decided to go ahead with them, since the kids were so excited and will be really let down if we have to miss them altogether. Since I know many place will be doing the same, I thought I'd go ahead and share the posts I'd originally planned to post about Valentine's Day before we lost power. 

We take advantage of seasonal materials when they come out--especially at the dollar store. I stocked up on heart shaped jewels, Valentine erasers, doilies, Valentine's cards, Conversation Heart candies and Valentine puzzles to put in the various centers in our class. 

The kids love playing with the erasers and jewels that I put in our math center. We do patterning counting matching and a wide variety of games with them. 

I drew a tic tac toe board on a few paper hearts and taught the kids how to play tic tac toe. It's easy to forget that with our digital age many children have never been exposed to it before. It'a a fun little game that is short enough to keep their interest, and can really hone those critical thinking skills!

We use Conversation heart candies in a variety of ways---we graph them, count the letters in them, sort by color, use them in science experiments and even paint with them! One of the ways we've used them this week is by using our magnifying glasses and doing letter hunts with them! The children have been busily writing their conversations from the hearts, comparing who has certain letters and finding letters from their names!

In our art center, we added some heart shaped paper and children free painted and practiced some new techniques, pressing the sides of the heart together to make symmetrical art.

Some kids just enjoyed drawing hearts and cutting them out with fancy scissors.

I bent some of our toilet paper tubes slightly to make heart shapes to dip in paint and stamp with. Some of them started stamping but ended up painting with the stamps as brushes.

Our one year old class made these cute hand and footprint cards for parents. So cute!

Of course we read lots of fun books about Valentine's Day! Here are some of our favorites:




I've added a new tab to the to of the page for books by theme. I'll be adding to this list as I go through the year! 

little illuminations: Books by Theme

If you are interested in more of our Valentine's activities, here are the links to some of my previous posts about our Valentine activities!

Valentine Bulletin Boards 2014

Valentine Fun in Pre-K

Valentine's Day Afterglow

Love Bugs

Our Valentine's Day Fun 2011

Conversation Hearts in The Class

Love Bugs 2011

Valentine's Box

Valentine's Day Fun

plus, look for the last 2 posts in later this week--one on Valentine Boxes and one about Valentine's Day fingerplays and flannelboards!

Be sure to check out my Valentine's Day board on Pinterest!





I love to read your comments!!! Be sure to leave your thoughts below!

Remembering Mom on Her Special Day

I hadn't planned to do much with my students for Mother's Day this year. Not that I haven't been thinking about it, but we are down to the final stretch---the last several days of school and we seem to have activities, field trips, activity days, etc. going on every day. But then I read Amy Wruble's post on Huff Post Parents "Let's Move Mother's Day" (check out the post, it's pretty funny and may hit home if you have one of those spouses that doesn't go all out for Mother's Day :) and remembered those little trinkets my kids made for me when they were small and in preschool. I know that now that my kids are much older, I won't get those anymore. And I can't bear to rob the moms of my students even just one of those precious keepsakes. I'm still finalizing our plan, and can't share it or it will spoil the surprise, but I saw this idea in our three year old class and knew I had to share it with you here. 

Mother's Day Corsages
They used 3 coffee filters, each scrunched together in the middle and each end dipped in watercolor paint. After drying, they were wrapped together with a chenille stem folded in half and poked through a lace doily. I would be proud to wear one of these corsages on Mother's Day! 

Last year, we made these little votives for our gift for Mom. Read more here.

If your are looking for some good books for Mother's Day, here are a few of my favorites:





I wish all the Moms, Grandmas and "Mom figures" (babysitters, aunts, teachers, etc.) a wonderful and very Happy Mother's Day!!! 
I'd love to know---what was YOUR favorite "priceless" gift for Mother's Day? Share it here in the comments!

Santa-Tizer! A Quick and Easy Gift To Make For Christmas!

Here is a quick and easy idea you can easily make for a last minute gift. I made these this year as teacher/staff gifts and I'm making a few more to put under the tree for those "just in case" gifts. I think next year, I'll experiment a little more with them and add some white fur embellishments around the top and
bottom, and possibly think about laminating the outside label.

Initially, I made 2 to see how they would come out before purchasing all the bottles of hand sanitizer I would need. When I bought the bulk, I didn't realize the bottles were curved (ergonomically to fit the hand, I suppose). Be sure to closely check the shape of the bottles!

I printed the words "Santa-tizer" on red paper and glued it onto the bottle to cover the label. Make sure to match your suit label size to cover the packaging label completely.

I added a thin black strip of paper around the bottle for a belt. Use glue and ultra-fine craft glitter to make a buckle.

The friends and staff I made these for loved them!


Thanks for visiting!  Be sure to leave a little "comment love"---I'd love for you to share your thoughts! 

Check out the little illuminations facebook fan page and see what we're sharing today!

Deck The Halls With Holiday Ornaments

Looking for a few ideas for holiday ornaments? I've got just the thing! Our preschool puts a large Christmas tree in the lobby every year and each class makes ornaments to decorate it. Here are a few of the cute ornaments adorning our tree this year:

School Glue Snowmen
These started out as those adorable "melted snowmen" I've seen all over Pinterest. It turns out that our floor is not quite level and the first few of our "melted snowmen" just didn't work out. The glue spread far and wide and the decorations all spread to the outer edges. We thought we'd place a plastic lid under the plastic wrap to help them retain some of their shape. Well, as they spread, they took on the shape of the lid. Not quite what we'd set out to make, but they did turn out pretty cute!

Cute As A Button
This it cute and simple! Arrange craft sticks in a triangle and glue on some colorful buttons!

Holly Wreath Frame
 Paper holly leaves glued on a painted paper plate circle make a cute frame for a holiday photo. This is also cute with puzzle pieces painted green as the holly leaves.

Reindeer Kids
Use a photo of your child has the reindeer face and add handprint antlers! Don't forget the red nose!

Collage Christmas Trees
These are cute with whatever loose parts you have lying around. I've done them with confetti glitter, too.

 

Handprint Wreaths
  Green construction paper handprints make the greenery and red handprints make the bow on this wreath.

And in case you missed it or need a few more ideas, there are several more in my December  PreK+K Sharing post, 10 Easy Gifts Kids Can Make For Christmas.

Thanks for visiting!  Be sure to leave a little "comment love"---I'd love for you to share your thoughts! 

Check out the little illuminations facebook fan page and see what we're sharing today!