A Simple Gift

Today was my 1st graders last day of school and we wanted to do something special for her teacher. This teacher has fostered such a great love of general learning and specifically reading in my daughter. Normally I like small, simple, inexpensive things, but this year I opted for a nice gift card to Barnes and Noble. Being a crafter, I couldn't just let it go at having my daughter hand her beloved teach a gift card! So-with a little inspiration from my mom and Skip to My Lou, I came up with this cute little flower/sucker bouquet. I cut my flowers using the Cricuit and the George and Basic Shapes cartridge. The suckers are homemade, but you could easily use store bought suckers. Stick the suckers down the middle of the flowers and into a floral foam piece inside the pot. I didn't have any ribbon that coordinated with the flowers, but I did have a different piece of patterned scrap paper that would work. I trimmed it to fit the rim of the flower pot and adhered it with double sided tape. This in itself would make a cute little gift for a friend, teacher, coworker, etc. If you want to add a little gift card though, take a plastic fork, stick your card in, and push the fork handle into the foam as well. As you can see, it looks like the card from the florist.

Cute, easy, and fast. (How fast? I did it this morning as my daughter was getting ready for school. Can we say procrastinator??:) )

If you want to make your own suckers, here's the recipe:

Supplies you'll need:

-candy thermometer

-sucker molds

-sucker sticks

Suckers:

1 c. sugar

1/3 c. light corn syrup

1/2 c. water

1/2 tsp. food coloring (or as desired)

1/2 tsp. flavoring

For fruity flavors: 1/8 tsp. citric acid crystals dissolved in 1 tsp water

Set up sucker molds with sticks on marble slab or aluminum foil. Spray with non-stick cooking spray. Set aside.

Boil water, sugar and corn syrup til about 290 (just before hard crack stage). Remove from heat; add food coloring and stir. Add citric acid if desired. Add flavoring. Stir and pour carefully into sucker molds and allow to cool. Remove gently from molds. Wrap individually or place in Ziploc bag. Enjoy!