Category Archives: Crafting

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DIY Teacher’s Gifts: A Lesson in Gratitude

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Okay, confession time.  I am not good at being grateful.  Oh,  I have manners and know when to say please and thank you and I’m sorry (I’m Canadian afterall!) but I am not so good at being full of gratitude.  Recently, I was having a discussion with some friends about this topic of gratitude and it triggered a thought… are my children truly thankful for all they have?  Am I truly thankful for all I have?!  I live in a wonderful country where I am free to post my feelings and thoughts on a blog such as this.  I have food on the table, clothes on my back, and a roof over my head.  We have two cars and a place we can enjoy in the summer.  Our family is truly blessed.  In fact, I think we have way too much!  I have to start sorting and sharing as soon as the hamster wheel slows down.  Gratitude is tricky.  Are words enough?  Do we need to repay the kindness of a gift with another, reciprocal gift?  How do we be good examples to our children and show kindness and exude gratitude without being caught in the cycle of looking like we want something in return?  I don’t have the answer to this one.  Leave me a comment if you have some insight!

What I do know, is that we gotta start somewhere!  So, I decided that after my friendly discussion and sudden enlightenment about my lack of proper parenting, I knew that I had to tackle some thank you gifts!  The end of the school year is a great time to make some gratitude filled, easy to make, teacher thank you gifts!  These ones were pretty frugal too… an added bonus!  #gratitudeWe started out with some simple, dollar-store clay pots and leftover plastic buckets from spring planting… and then decorated away with paints and stickers and ribbons — stuff I had hanging around from other projects.  The paint didn’t stick to the green plastic, so we used some fun stickers and ABC’s for those.  The youngest and I had a nice bonding time doing some crafting… and it was a great opportunity for me to encourage her.  She didn’t think her bee looked quite right… so we added whimsical googly eyes … with such a cute result!

Next, we spooned in some dirt and simply added cuttings from some of my overgrown house plants!  This not only served our purpose, but gave us another opportunity to discuss sharing and being thankful for what we already have!  Succulents are perfect for this, as you don’t need much preparation ahead of time… simply snip and stick in some soil… this kalanchoe we had was spreading and already had tiny root shoots… so was easy to transplant.  We also separated some herbs and a lovely purple shamrock plant.  In the end, we had six quick and easy (and almost free!) gifts… enough for three elementary teachers and a few great sunday school helpers!  Some hand made cards topped off the lesson in gratitude (hand written by the kids, of course!) and volila!

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Teachers are very special people… and I am forever telling our four beloveds that teachers play a huge part in their lives!  Trust me… it is really hard to impart information to a large group of young people from diverse backgrounds who often don’t want to be sitting in that desk in front of you.  Especially when they come with a set of parents watching your every move.  Be kind to teachers.  They are human too.  They need some love and thanks after a full year in the classroom!

I’m not sure that my gratitude level has jumped too many degrees up the scale from this project… but at least it gave me a chance to chat a bit with the youngest two — and share some love around.  Perhaps it’s a start.  Perhaps it will “grow” on us as we practice more…. Sorry… couldn’t resist… some teacher taught me about puns once… aren’t you grateful? 🙂

 

P.S.  Once you have said “thank you” to your beloved teachers and said good-bye for another school year… keep following mittonmusings.com!  Click the follow button on the side bar … I have some exciting changes coming this summer!  You won’t want to miss it!!

 

 

 

Dinosaur Fossils: My First Guest Post!

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Thanks so much for following along with me at mittonmusings.com!  I am encouraged by my steady increase in “followers” and am thoroughly enjoying the adventure.  Thank you for participating in the journey!  If you care to share, please pass on your favourite post via google+, facebook, bloglovin’, instagram or pinterest!  Drumroll… I am now tweeting on Twitter too!  You can also email your friends the link or follow along via wordpress reader!  Ha!  You can even TALK to others about it… how crazy would that be?! I am quickly learning that in the blog “underworld” (yes, it truly is another world lying in the shadows of a undiscovered realm of bloggers and writers in this thing we call the internet!) sharing is the biggest way that you can grow! As I learn to put myself  “out there”,  I am happy to announce that I have shared in my first guest post!  So… instead of posting another blog this week… please head on over to visit Anna at abrazoandcoze.com and read all about my easy dinosaur fossil craft!

 

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I’ll be back next Tuesday with another muse about something close to my heart!  Until then, encourage one another, love deeply and smile a little.  🙂

 

The City Mouse and The Country Mouse (What’s your Comfort Zone?)

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mouseDoes anyone remember an old story about the City Mouse and the Country Mouse?  Two mice who were friends decided to visit each other’s homes and soon discovered they had stepped out of their “comfort zones”.  The city mouse lived with too busy a lifestyle and dangers (like the cat!) were all around.  The country mouse had to work too hard to get any of the luxuries of home and enjoyed too much quiet.  They quickly realized that although their friend’s home was a “nice place to visit” they didn’t want to live there.

We are much the same.  I have always lived in the big city.  Okay… suburbs… but still a place where opportunities are, and culture and diversity are readily available.  And yet, I am drawn to the country.  I love the quiet of a forest.  I want chickens.  Fresh strawberries mean summer.  It’s quite fascinating to me how the grass is always greener on the other side (be it manicured lawns or manure filled fertilizer), and yet we fall back into what is familiar to us.  It takes a special person to step out in faith and go out of that familiar spot.  I wish I had just a bit more of it.

I wish I had just a little bit of that “chutzpah”. To live on the edge, just a tad, and dangle my feet in the unknown.  To be radically changed.  Just a bit.  Not too much. Because the fear of the unknown is too great.  That cat does not exhilarate the ride.  It makes me want to go home where it is safe.  How do we gather up that gumpshun and try new things?  Where do we get that radical faith?  Many of those in history labeled as “great in the faith” or “radical” didn’t think they were anyone special.  They just did what they had to do, and were rewarded for their efforts.

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Radical People of Faith often just do what they have to do and are rewarded for their efforts.

Francis Chan is a speaker/author I have been hearing a lot from lately.  As I write this post, they are celebrating the life of Rev. Billy Graham in the United States.  These men of faith didn’t do anything extraordinary.  They just did what they felt God told them to do.  The city mouse and the country mouse went to visit each other because they cared about their friend, and wanted to share in their experiences.  Perhaps our efforts are built around our relationships.  We care about the rights of the poor or the oppressed so we stand up against the injustices.  We care about the next generation so we teach our children and love, foster and adopt the orphan.  We care about families so we do our best to nurture our marriages.  We care about our friends so we love our neighbours as ourselves and serve in our communities.

Maybe it’s not about stepping out of our comfort zones as much as deepening our relationships.  Our passions flourish when we use our gifts.  We get the guts to be radically different when we truly want to accomplish something that we believe in.  Sheeesh… I started a blog!  (I just had to ask for help doing an e-transfer last week! Talk about out of my element). (You can read more about why I started my blog in this post!) We stand up against that big, scary cat and then we go home and appreciate where we have come from.  We are renewed by familiarity.  Seeing things from another’s perspective is hard.  My hubby reminds me all the time to do this.  It’s not easy for me to cross out of my “happy place”. To go beyond the boundary and try to put myself in someone else’s shoes. But when I do… I am often rewarded beyond my expectations and find my faith stretched and strengthened.  It doesn’t seem like such an effort when it means a lot to me.  I think that is true for many who go out of their “comfort zone”.  Perhaps we all need to just put a smile on our face, make the first giant leap and go for it!

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Maybe it’s not about stepping out of our comfort zones as much as deepening our relationships.

Did you like the little mice in this week’s post?  They are “felted”… a new craft I just tried (hey… I stepped out!) and the pics are on our new Pinterest Board under “Things we Love”.  Be sure to check it out and give credit to the artizans who have mastered the work.  They are soo cute!