Once again I found myself at the end of a school year with half a dozen teachers, classroom aids, therapists and drivers to thank for all the wonderful work they do supporting my special needs kiddos.
I poked around Pinterest for weeks, but was having a hard time finding something that made sense to give to all the different types of professionals, 4 of whom work inside the same classroom.
This adorable concept caught my eye, and a teacher friend confirmed it's something she would like to receive. But at that point I had less than 24 hours left to sort it out and the store I had time to go to didn't have the kind of mini plants I needed.
My backup plan was Starbucks gift cards and and using my savior Tagxedo to make personalized word cloud cards to put them in like I did for the classroom supply teacher appreciation gift basket a few years ago. But it didn't seem nice enough after having my heart set on the floral idea.
This bright, pretty pot of begonias caught my eye as I was doing one last desperate wander through the grocery store. I thought about the little sticks that hold cards in bouquets. And voila! Idea mashup.
The store didn't have any floral card holders, but the craft section had little dowels and mini clothes pins. The flowers and crafty bits were only about $11 total. I already had card stock at home. Problem solved.
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| Not officially a project until there's a reason to break out the glue gun! |
I made the word cloud cards half the size of the ones I made last time to make sure they weren't too heavy for the little clothes pins. That allowed me to print two at once on the same piece of card stock. (Free printable card templates below).
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| This is what you're going for on the front/back of the card stock. |
You'd think that would save time and paper, but if your spatial relationship skills are anything like mine then correctly flipping the paper to print the back results in a lot of headdesking and cursing and this...
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| My incompetence is flexible. I also managed to get some with upside down text. |
I used a ruler to find the center point and my scrapbook cutter to separate the halves because my scissor work leaves something to be desired.
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| Almost never actually use it to scrapbook but I've found a hundred other uses for this little gadget. |
This is the point at which I enlist the child whose academic and therapeutic team is being appreciated. They've spent the last two years teaching him stuff like how to interact with other humans, and have made impressive progress in getting him to write his name.
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| The Sharpie was a calculated risk. Also? When did my baby get so big?! |
I think the flowers and cards are just fine on their own. Or possibly paired with something cute and handmade by the kiddo like these hand painted bookmarks we made for the teaching team when my first son was growing out of this same early childhood program.
I had already bought a pile of Starbucks gift cards because I'd given up on finding the right floral solution when I stumbled across the begonias. Since the gift cards were already on hand, I taped one inside each of the personalized teacher cards.
It took longer for the glue gun to heat up than it did to make the card holders.
It would be lovely to give one to each individual team member. I was on a tight timeline, had already spent $100 on Starbucks gift cards and didn't want to figure out how to carry so many full size flower pots into the school. The whole team works out of the same classroom, so in this case I put all four gift cards into the same flower pot. You may want to go with the individual approach, depending on your school team's configuration.
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| Teachers + Therapists = Appreciated! |
Free Printable PDF Templates
Here is a variety of templates with a couple of generic teacher friendly word cloud pictures and thank you messages. If you don't have the time or patience to tinker with custom word clouds and Photoshop, you can mix and match these to whip up homemade cards in less than a minute.
Two Smaller Cards on One Page
Word Cloud Teacher Appreciation Dual 4.25x5.5 Cards - Outside
Image: General Teacher Word Cloud, Flower
Word Cloud Teacher Appreciation Dual 4.25x5.5 Cards - Outside
Image: General Teacher Word Cloud, Apple
Word Cloud Teacher Appreciation Dual 4.25x5.5 Cards - Inside
Message: Thank you for helping me grow!
Word Cloud Teacher Appreciation Dual 4.25x5.5 Cards - Inside
Message: Thank you for helping me learn!
Word Cloud Teacher Appreciation Dual 4.25x5.5 Cards - Inside
Message: Thank you for being my teacher!
One Larger Card on One Page
Word Cloud Teacher Appreciation Single 5.5x8.5 Card - Outside
Image: General Teacher Word Cloud, Flower
Word Cloud Teacher Appreciation Single 5.5x8.5 Card - Outside
Image: General Teacher Word Cloud, Apple
Word Cloud Teacher Appreciation Single 5.5x8.5 Card - Inside
Message: Thank you for helping me grow!
Word Cloud Teacher Appreciation Single 5.5x8.5 Card - Inside
Message: Thank you for helping me learn!
Word Cloud Teacher Appreciation Single 5.5x8.5 Card - Inside
Message: Thank you for being my teacher!
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