Father's Day M&M Printable

Here's a fun Father's Day printable.  Simply print it out and attach to a bag of M&M's.

Feel free to use it if you like it.  I'm all about sharing.

Click HERE to get the PDF that has 10 tags per sheet.

Click HERE to get the PDF that has 6 larger tags per sheet.

The 5 Love Languages

Feeling loved is a primary emotional need for all humans.  There are countless poems, letters, stories, books, and songs written about love.

Here's one song that kept running through my mind as I contemplated writing this post -
Everybody.  The chorus repeats, "Everybody, everybody wants to love, everybody, everybody wants to be loved."  So, so true.

In Dr. Gary Chapman's book, "The 5 Love Languages," it says, "Child psychologists affirm that every child has certain basic emotional needs that must be met if he is to be emotionally stable. Among those emotional needs, none is more basic that the need for love and affection, the need to sense that he or she belongs and is wanted.  With an adequate supply of affection, the child will likely develop into a responsible adult.  Without that love, he or she will be emotionally and socially challenged." (You can listen to this book on YouTube).

Dr. Chapman shares a wonderful metaphor to illustrate the importance of feeling loved.  He heard this metaphor from Dr. Ross Campbell who is a psychiatrist who specialized in the treatment of children and adolescents.

The 5 Love Languages - Ideas for Couples

Click HERE to read my original post about The 5 Love Languages.

5 LOVE LANGUAGES FOR COUPLES

Need some ideas on how to speak your spouse's love language?  Here are some from Dr. Chapman's book:

The 5 Love Languages of Children

Click HERE to read my original post about The 5 Love Languages.

The 5 Love Languages aren't just for couples - They apply to everyone you interact with.  As a mom of three boys, I found this information very helpful in my parenting since I spend so much of my life focusing on my children (and my spouse).  We all know that each child is unique and that they each need different things from us.  After learning about the Love Languages, I feel that my parenting skills have improved.  (Too bad I didn't read it 19 years ago!)

Here are descriptions of The 5 Love Languages in regards to children:

Christmas Hersheys Candy Bar Wrappers

I consider myself a pretty thoughtful person but usually I feel overwhelmed during the holidays so my thoughtfulness doesn't always end up matching my actions... well at least not without a lot of sleep deprivation and stress.  I'm sure many people can relate.

So this year I decided that I would get on top of the teacher gifts earlier than in years past.  That means not staying up late the night before the last day of school to get them all put together.  

My kids switch classes so that means I have 18 teacher gifts to make.  Plus my cute hubby decided he wanted me to make them for his coworkers so that added another dozen or so.

I have compassion on those who are in the same boat as I am so I decided to share my super easy gift with others to spread the Christmas joy and ease some stress.  The bars listed above have my personalized wrappers but I created a generic one for others to use (after receiving requests from several of my friends around the country).

Here's how to do it.

Christmas Videos for Families

I know it is a little early, but I wanted to share these great Christmas videos.  They aren't very long and are wonderful reminders about the true meaning of Christmas.

For little kids:

Our Christmas Story Tree

A Gift for Jesus

The First Christmas Gift

For bigger kids:

What Shall We Give?

The Greatest Gift

For the whole family:

The Christmas Spirit

Good Tidings of Great Joy: The Birth of Jesus Christ

A Bright Shining Star

Teacher Appreciation Subway Sign

Don't you hate it when you see something cute pinned on Pinterest and you click on the link and it doesn't have a source page?  So frustrating!  Well that happened to me with a Teacher Appreciation subway sign so I recreated my own version of it.  Justice restored! :)

Feel free to use it.

Father's Day Poem - You're the peanut to my butter...

I found this saying on pinterest and decided to create my own version of it.  I'm going to buy Peanut Butter MnM's, Starbursts, Pop Tarts, Froot Loops, etc. to give to my hubby in a basket for Father's day.  We'll also give him some biking clothing he wanted but I wanted to do something cutesy with it and he loves junky food unfortunately.  Luckily the long distance biking sort of counteracts that.

I did two different versions of this Father's Day printable:

I also modified it so it could be used for a friend on any occasion.  Have fun!

Father's Day - You're the BEARY best dad!

For church on Sunday, we are making a small Father's Day gift for each of the children to give their dads.

We put around 20 gummy bears in each 3"x 4" ziplock bag and then I made some tags to staples to the bag.

I designed a graphic to be printed as 4"x 6" pictures at Costco (or wherever).  There are four tags that are 2"x 3" big that fit perfectly when stapled to the top of each bag.  I stuck a little tuft of green tulle behind the tag when I stapled it on.  I hope the dads enjoy them!

Here's the graphic in case you'd like to do this too.

Primary Talk - "If I Live Worthily, the Holy Ghost Will Help Me Choose the Right"

Imagine you have a special friend that you really love to be around.

A friend who helps comfort you when you are sad or scared. 

A friend who makes you have a warm, happy feeling in your heart. 

A friend who encourages you to do kind things for others.

A friend who helps teach you right from wrong. 

You’d probably want to invite a special friend like this to your home.  You’d probably clean your house and plan some things to do that would make your friend feel comfortable and welcome.  When your friend arrived, you’d listen carefully to that friend.  You may even tell your friend how glad you are to be with him or her.

The Holy Ghost is a special friend to you. The Holy Ghost can bring feelings of warmth, love, peace, joy, and can help you want to do good. When you feel the Holy Ghost with you, thank Heavenly Father for this blessing. The Holy Ghost is one of the greatest gifts Father in Heaven can give you.

Just as you’d like to nourish a good relationship with a friend, the companionship of the Holy Ghost can be encouraged in much the same way.  We need to be our best and be worthy to have the Holy Ghost with us.

Here are five ways to live worthy to have the Holy Ghost with us.

Keep our bodies and minds clean.

Have faith.

Avoid sin.

Pray.

Read and ponder the scriptures.

If you do these things, you never need to feel alone, for you will have the most important companion and friend of all—the Holy Ghost.

The above talk is based on these articles from The Friend magazine:

Courting the Holy Ghost

The Holy Ghost Can Help Me

Primary Lesson 19, Manual 5 - "The Saints Are Taught to Recognize Good and Evil"

Here's my handout for church this Sunday to go with Lesson 19 .  I'm posting it on Friday instead of waiting until Saturday night or Sunday morning LOL.

This is an object lesson that I will be using.  The basic idea of it is from the manual but I added the questions/examples in the beginning and also changed some of the wording so that my younger kids could better understand.

Which would you rather have— an imitation item or the real thing?

Would you rather have a cheap fake flower or a beautiful fresh rose? Would you rather have a valuable diamond ring or a fake ring that will fall apart soon? Would you rather snack on a real apple or a plastic one? Would you rather have a true friend or a person who pretends to be your friend?

Imitations are often of poorer quality or less value than the real things they imitate.  Satan is a counterfeiter. He tries to deceive us with bad imitations of good things Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ have given us. He does this because he wants us to follow him instead of Heavenly Father and Jesus.

Teacher Appreciation - Donuts, Popcorn, Dips (Printables)

For Teacher Appreciation, we put out treats and snacks for the teachers and staff several times during the week.

One of the days we are putting out a bunch of DIPS.  Veggies & hummus, crackers & artichoke dip, chips & salsa, etc.  We have several teachers who don't like to eat sugar and junk-food so I am trying to offer some healthier snacks that are still yummy.  I'll put this graphic up on an easel.  I printed it at Costco as an 8x10 picture and it looks awesome!

We have a great connection for delicious donuts at an extremely discounted price so we'll have donuts one of the mornings.  This is the 8x10 picture that I'll display with the donuts.  Of course most of my stuff involves cheesy puns.

I know the teachers will absolutely love popcorn day tomorrow.  At Costco, they sell different types of popcorn in bags.  I think they just started selling these in the past few months and they are super popular.  One of the popcorn bags is "Sweet and Salty" (kettle corn) and is addictive!  They also offer a "Nearly Naked" popcorn that is just popcorn, healthy coconut oil, and sea salt.  Yummy and fairly healthy.  The third kind of popcorn is not remotely healthy but is incredibly delicious.  It is "Chicago Style" which is a mix of cheese popcorn and caramel popcorn.  I am not a huge fan of the cheesy popcorn but it is delicious as a mix.  I first had this when we visited Chicago several years back.  Here's the picture/poster I am displaying with the popcorn.

Whatever we do, the teachers are just thrilled.  They love to feel appreciated and valued.  And I love that they put up with all my puns and themed treats and goodies. :)

I used Stampin' Up's My Digital Studio along with some generic graphics from Microsoft to make these signs.

PS Here are some additional signs that I made for my sister-in-law's school.  I changed the popcorn one to included different flavors.  She got a local bakery to donate cookies for all the teachers.  I think she put out some candy with the last poster.

Teacher Appreciation Quotes for IKEA Frames

Teacher Appreciation Week is coming up and I am in charge of doing cute, fun stuff for the 70+ teachers at our elementary school.

Well, I LOVE LOVE LOVE these IKEA frames for $0.99.

I've used them myself a ton for parties, showers, wedding receptions, etc. and I knew the teachers would find good uses for them too.  And for $0.99, that is just a screaming deal.  IKEA rocks that way.

So I designed some cute pictures to go in the frame.  The frame fits a 4x6 inch picture and I develop my pictures at Costco for $0.13 plus tax.

I made one picture that says "Please Sign-in Here" and did it in our school's color theme with the school mascot on it (not pictured due to privacy concerns).  The teachers can use those signs for Back to School Night, Open House, Parent Teacher Conferences, etc.  Practical, yet cute and the total cost of frame and 2 pictures is less than $1.50 per teacher.

Then I made a bunch of quotes so that the teachers could display them on their desk for everyday use.  I did a variety of color themes and will let the teachers pick one each (first come, first served).  They could also put family pictures or something else and it is double sided so you can display two pics at once.

I used Stampin' Up's My Digital Studio graphics to design them.  They have a cool program you can use to design cards, invitations, etc.  I highly recommend it and no, I don't sell Stampin' Up and I do not get paid to say that LOL.  I designed my pics on PowerPoint (which I'm addicted to) and just inserted graphics from the Stampin' Up package I purchased.

I know the teachers are going to love these.  You can also use this same concept, with different quotes obviously, for Mother's Day, Young Women, birthdays, baptisms, etc.  Have fun with it!

See THIS POST for how I used these IKEA frames for a wedding reception.

Easter Handout - Jesus Died that You Might Live

Here's a handout I made for my friend to give to her class at church.  I think I'll make the same thing for my class of Primary children :)

Teacher Appreciation Ideas

Teacher Appreciation Week will be May 6-10, 2013.  I'm in charge of making cute little handouts to go in the teacher mailboxes each day that week.  I thought I'd share my ideas in case anyone wants to use them.

You may wonder why there are two handouts stuck together.  Well, I designed them so that I could send them to Costco (or whatever photo place) and print them as 4x6 pics and then just cut them in half and attach them to the candy.  It seemed a lot easier and more affordable than printing them on my printer at home.

This handout goes with "Caramel Apple Sugar Babies" candies.  They are surprisingly yummy but probably terrible for your teeth!

I bought some mini "Three Musketeers" bars right after Valentine's Day that were strawberry flavored with dark chocolate around them.  Quite tasty!  You could also use this handout with chocolate covered strawberries, strawberry licorice, or any strawberry flavored item.

I also bought some individual size "Reese's Pieces" candies and will attach this saying to it.  Another cute idea would be buying the pieces in bulk and putting them in a cute little container or bag.  I think Reese's Pieces are an under-appreciated candy.  If they were good enough for ET, they are good enough for the teachers, right?  (NOTE:  When I went to Costco to get these printed, the first graphic below wasn't very bright orange so I designed a second one that is brighter and matches the Reese's Pieces packaging.  Feel free to use either one).

Here's a handout I made to go with a little baggy of Hershey's kisses.

I will do a few more fun things but I thought I'd share what I designed already.  I'll post more ideas

Teacher Appreciation - Test Survival Pills

I designed these fun, fake prescription labels to put on real pharmacy bottles that I collected from a friend and then sanitized.  We will fill them with MnM candies and give them to the teachers right before the big standardized testing begins.  I think they'll love them!

Note: Our school nurse was not happy when we passed these out.  She wants to make sure kids don't think pills are candy.  Some of our aides were passing the candy out to the kids on the playground which was totally inappropriate.   So if you pass these out, have the teachers keep them away from the kids to avoid confusion and by all means don't pass them out to kids.  Someone was having a brainless moment when they did that.

Baptism - Eight is Great Donuts

This is a cute idea that is floating out there in Pinterest-land.  You put two mini donuts in a bag and it looks like an 8.  Then put a cute topper on the bag to seal it shut and give them to your baptism guests.  I wish I had known about this when my kiddos were baptized.

I wanted to copy this creative idea and make pink and blue graphics with this theme.  You fold the paper in half and then staple them on the bag of two mini donuts.  Feel free to use them if you'd like.

Christmas SOCKING

My friend Stephanie and I created this fun Christmas service activity.  It is sort of like "boo-ing" at Halloween, but you use a stocking.

I wanted to make this simple and easy so I made this cute handout, laminated it, and attached it permanently to the stocking and calling it good. This way no one has to be burdened with making copies like you do with boo-ing. You can buy stockings from the dollar store and put any simple treat inside.

Since I am starting this up in my neighborhood, we are using four stockings with poems instead of just one.  That way the tradition will spread more quickly.

Click HERE to go to GoogleDocs and get this shorter version of the poem in color as a PDF file.

Click HERE to get this longer version of the poem in color as a PDF.

Click HERE to get a PDF file of this black and white version on Google Drive.

NOTE: Due to the popularity of this initial post, I created a few more versions of this "Christmas Socking" poem.  Enjoy!  By the way, there is a GoogleDrive link for each of the poems so that you can get PDF files to print.  If that doesn't work for you or if you want a PowerPoint version to edit, you can email me at pamthemom@gmail.com and tell me what you'd like me to send to you.  I wrote the poems so feel free to copy them without feeling guilty :)

 For the OFFICE - Click HERE to get a PDF

For teachers to do at school (teachers and staff participating, not kids) - Note, I changed the turn-around time to 24 hours and also made it end the last day before holiday break.  Click HERE to get the PDF file.

For a friend (who isn't necessarily a neighbor).  Click HERE to get the PDF.

I received an email from a blog reader who requested a version that could be used for her friends who celebrate holidays other than Christmas.  The whole "stocking" theme can't really be eliminated but I substituted out the word Christmas for Holidays instead so she could share the fun with friends of different religious backgrounds.  Click HERE to get a PDF.

Some blog readers requested that I create a sign for people to put up after they've been "socked" so here ya go!

Click HERE to get a PDF file of these "We've Been Socked" signs (2 per page) on Google Drive.

Click HERE to get the PDF file of "I've Been Socked" signs (2 per page) on Google Drive.  These might work better for an office or school setting.

Happy socking!  Spread the tradition!