Back to School Gifts

So, I've been busily preparing for today - the first day of school. I apologize for not sharing posts every day. I knew it would probably slow down at the start of school. I am pretty tired after today, but I will share a post about the gifts I made for the front office staff. They've all been delivered so I can finally blog about them. I gave my head principal, her secretary, and the two counselors the same gifts. I made them all To Do pads with the sheets I made for my teacher planner. I had the copy person at our local Staples make a color copy onto cardstock that is glossy on one side and mat on the other for the cover, I also made 25 black and white copies of the same sheet for the inside, I cut off the back off some notepads that were just about all used up, and then I had the Staples copy person coil bind it all together. 

Here they are. You can see the front covers. 

The second picture shows what the inside looks like.

I know these will be utilized in our front office. :)

I also made all four principals, the secretary, the two counselors, their secretary, the school nurse, our school copy person, the data clerk, and attendance clerk a pencil made with mentos and Hershey's kisses. I saw the project on Pinterest with Rolos, but I could NOT find Rolos in rolls last night at Wal-mart. I first made the eraser part with pink scrapbook paper. I used the inside part of a tape dispenser to draw a small circle. I then cut it out about an inch larger than the inner circle. 

In order to be able to fold it over the end of the mentos roll, I had to cut slits in the outer circle. 

I then placed one end of the mentos roll onto the inner circle and folded the flaps down and taped them to the outside of the mentos roll. 

After I had it taped all the way around, I then laid it onto a sheet of yellow scrapbook paper to size it. I cut out the appropriate size, wrapped the mentos roll, and taped it down. 

I then cut out a thin strip of aluminum foil and wrapped around the end to cover the transition from the pink eraser part to the yellow pencil part (to look like that metal part of a pencil). I just adhered it with a small piece of tape. 

I made so many of these. This was NOT one of my better ones. The pink is too short on this one (like the eraser has been used a lot - lol.), and the aluminum foil is too wide on this one. I was up until 10:30 last night making these, so I must have been tired when I made this one. 

I then taped a Hershey's kiss on the opposite end of the "eraser" to make the tip. I also had wrapped a few with more aluminum foil to better keep it attached to the rest of the "pencil." By the last few I made, I found I could just tape the kiss to the mentos roll and it stayed (and looked better). 

I then wrote our school name and mascot on the outside, along with No. 1. One of our assistant principals always says, "You're number one," to like everyone, so I thought putting No. 1 in stead of No. 2, would be cute. 

I then wrote, "Happy First Day!" and signed it. I got some neat responses. I just wanted to make our hard-working office staff smile on what I knew would be a hectic day for them. I wrote a nice letter (by hand) to the four principals, the two counselors, and the secretary as well. 

I gave the three assistant principals the elongated pillow boxes (made from paper towel rolls) - blogged about these last week, I think - stuffed with a package of pens, a band pencil, a small owl eraser, and a piece of candy. 

Here's a picture of them again. I also had a little typed note on the outside of each of them wishing them a happy first day of school. 

Well, I hope to blog more this week - I already have pictures that I took that I will include. Just hang in there with me. :)

I hope you all had a great first day back to school today. I did. I'm tired, but am confident that it will be a great year.