With the end of term upon us, and for many the end of their time at a school, parents minds everywhere will be thinking about what thank you gifts to get their children’s teacher.
As a primary school teacher for many years, Becky has had all sorts of wonderful thank you gifts; including this March when a thoughtful parent at the start of lockdown gifted a much sought after toilet roll and packet of paracetamol!
More common are bunches of flowers and so we thought we would give you some ‘flowers but not flowers’ ideas for your teacher gifts this year.
Dried Flower Foot soak
Teaching is hard work, and you’re on your feet all day, so what better way to treat your teacher than a relaxing and restorative foot soak?
Using a few simple ingredients, children can mix this up themselves and pop it into jars or small bags tied with ribbon. You’ll need:
-Epsom Salts
-Dead Sea or Himalayan salt (or a mix of both)
-Dried flowers (lavender, rose, marigold, chamomile and cornflower all work well)
-Essential oils (try Lavender and Jasmine for a relaxing soak, Peppermint and Eucalyptus for a refreshing lift)
Mix the salts in a bowl, add essential oils and mix well so the oils are evenly distributed (start with five drops and increase depending on how much you’re making and how strong you want the scent, but be aware some in high concentrations can cause skin reactions so go carefully).
Then either gently stir in your flower petals or create a layered effect in your jars by alternating the salt mix and the flower petals.
Finish with a pretty tag listing your ingredients (just in case of allergies), and instructions to add a scoop to hot water and relax!
Pressed and Fresh Petal Thank You Cards
Homemade thank you cards are always lovely to receive and if your child is a reluctant drawer this is a great way to get them involved.
We’ve created a downloadable sheet of characters for you to use as a base, so simply cut out the one you’d like to use, decorate with pressed flowers or fresh petals and leaves and mount on a card and add your message.
Children love the ease with which they can create the characters’ outfits, and there are endless possibilities depending on the leaves and flowers you gather.
Fresh petals will obviously dry out and change slightly but if you haven’t got a stash of dried flowers to use they still work very well.
Alternatively, it makes a lovely evening activity when everyone’s gone to bed, and you’ve got a quiet half hour.
Forget-me-not hearts and pretty posies of pressed flowers are easy to create and just need a small amount of PVA glue to hold them in place.
Flower Petal Shortbread
Shortbread is a great biscuit to make because they only need three ingredients, and they go perfectly with a cup of tea.
This is a straightforward child-friendly recipe and doesn’t require any cutters. To make them you’ll need:
-Self Raising Flour 400g
-Butter 200g
-Sugar 100g
-Edible flower petals (rose, marigold, cornflower, pansy, lavender, thyme and geranium all work well)
Preheat the oven to 160C.
Gently rub the butter into the flour till you get a very fine sand. Stir in the sugar.
Tip the mix into a lined baking tray and gently press down with a rolling pin or your hands to compress the mix together.
Bake for approximately 20 minutes depending on how thick your biscuits are (I never seem to have the right tray size to hand, so judge by eye when your biscuits are a light golden colour they’re perfect)
Use a sharp knife to carefully recut the biscuits whilst still hot.
Decorate the biscuits by placing the flower petals on top and gently pressing them down, so they are firmly stuck to the surface. Sprinkle with sugar.
Then leave to cool for as long as you can resist them (ideally an hour)
These are so easy to customise depending on your taste. For extra floral flavour try adding lavender or rose-infused sugar.
Earl grey tea is a wonderful addition; sprinkle in the contents of one tea bag to the mix when adding the sugar.
Orange and lemon zest creates a delicious citrus twist. Ground cardamom or cinnamon add warming spice.
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