Ho ho ho from the Ding Dongs

Ho Ho Ho

from the

Ding Dongs!

This year we put together these cute little gift packages for the kids to deliver to their friends. We then drove to their friends house and each kid got to set these on the porch ring the bell and then run to the car. They had a blast and their friend (and parents) loved the little surprises left on their porches.

I gathered paper and stickers that I keep in a sticker box. We then made the cute little signs for the packages.

Then we just tied together a box of Ho Hos and a box of Ding Dongs together with Christmas Ribbon and slid in the handmade signs.

                        School Christmas Party Favors
With three boys in school this year I decided to do simpler party favors, but still cute of course! For my 3rd graders class I made snowman soup packs and attached them to cute glass milk bottles that were found at target. This was pretty easy to put together. 

I purchased pre-packaged hot chocolate mix to speed up the assembly and to cut down on the mess. I found boxes of mix for $1 each at target. I opted to get the snowman marshmallow peeps, $1.85 a pack and a large box of Candy canes was $2. 

 
 These are the milk bottles from Target's $1 section. Total spent for 16 favors came in a little under $25.

I used ziplock bags I had and folded them in half.

Attach the snowman soup labels to ziplock bag and tie on the candy canes.

Then just tie the ribbon and the neck of the bottle.

For Kindergarten I made Hershey Bar Snowman. These were so easy and took about 10-15 minutes to put together 16 favors.

Start out with the full size chocolate bars and printed snowman. I folded one size in and taped it to the bar to keep the wrapper from sliding and then folded the other side in and closed it with another pice of clear tape.

I actually forgot to buy fleece from the fabric store so I found some wide ribbon in my wrapping room and then grabbed thin red & white ribbon to tie the hats together.

Attach the ribbon or felt with a hot glue gun. Then tie the thinner ribbon around to give them the hat shape.

These ended up costing around $10 for 16 favors.

 
Lastly, for my 5th grader I made for of the snowman soup packs. I did these a little different with regular marshmallows and different printables. I was able to make 15 for $8 and it only took 10 minutes to throw these together!

Christmas Bake Sale: Raising $ For Charity

In our home we love Christmas! It is my most favorite time of year. I've always loved Christmas lights. I remember as a little kid driving to the city close to where we lived to look at lights. Every year my dad would do a different theme of lights and normally put some design on our roof. A few years ago when we moved to our current  house I got the idea to really do it up. So, each year we add more lights, decorations and colors. As our lights grew so did the amount of people driving by to see our crazy house. Last year the boys came up with the idea to sell hot chocolate and cookies and use the money to buy Christmas presents for local kids in need. So, with the weather being so great for this time of year we decided to throw it together. The boys were each in charge of a sign and all helped make treats. We made Rudolph Rolo Pretzels. I love these because they are easy (my 6 year old put them together by himself) and super tasty. You can find the recipe here:
Rudolph Rolo Pretzel Bites
We made sugar cookies, chocolate covered pretzels, chocolate covered Oreos and Mickey mouse oreos. Find the tutorial here:
Mickey Oreos
We then bagged everything up, tied it with a cute ribbon and headed out. The evening was a success! The boys can't wait to go pick up presents with money they earned.

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