This is the first of a set of four cards I made. ItÂ’s kind of a long story behind it, so if youÂ’re up to reading a couple of minutes - hereÂ’s the scoop:
Staff Appreciation 2005
During April of every year we have a staff appreciation week at our school, Linden Christian School. We have about 86 staff (Administration and Teaching Faculty for Grades K-12). We also give recognition and acknowledgement to the support and custodial staff for there hard work. During that week, we, the parents & students, try to come up with innovative and creative ways to encourage the staff and show them just how much we appreciate them. This is a huge moral booster for the Staff and, according to them, one of the highlights of the year.
This year, our theme was 'Fruits of the Spirit' as found in Gal 5:22-23 (But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control.”)
Each class was tasked to come up with a poster, skid, poem, song or whatever to give to their teacher. The Parent Representative for each class helped to do this during lunch hours when the teacher was out. There was quilt style posters, where ea child wrote what Fruit of the Spirit they see and appreciate about their teacher. My one son’s class each traced and cut their handprint and made a “quilt poster” reading ‘You are the best teacher hands down!!! with each of their hands glued down on there (see picture Staff Appreciation - Hands Down Paper Quilt.)
As "Creative Engineer" it was my responsibility to come up with the creative ideas - no pressure there!
I chose to go with the Sun Ripened 1 stamp set that was discontinued in 2004.
For every day we had a fruit, color and scripture that tied into Gal 5:22-23 highlighting one of the fruits (characteristic) that we appreciate about them.
Monday was color orange, oranges and 'Joy'.
Tuesday was color yellow, lemons and 'Gentleness'.
Wednesday was red, apples and 'Peace'.
Thursday was green, pears and 'Goodness'; and
Friday was purple/lilac, grapes and 'Faithfulness'.
On Monday we had a drive-through ‘pit stop’. On their way into work at the entrance to the school, staff was requested to stop for a ‘refueling’. They were handed a Tom Horton’s cup with a choice of coffee, tea, or orange juice together with a homemade Cinnamon Roll (individually packaged). I designed a sleeve for the cup with the scripture verse of the day and oranges on it.
On Tuesday they each received a package (wrapped with brown paper, raffia and tag) containing 4 cards that they can use to give to somebody. (This is one of the 4 cards). They also each got a Hershey chocolate bar wrapped with stamped paper and “Have A Great Day” label (See: Staff Appreciation - chocolate bar).
On Wednesday we had a Pie Day - parents donated pies that were set up with baskets of fruit in the Staff Rooms.
For Thursday we presented them ea with a dozen homemade cookies. The cookies were packaged in brown paper lunch bags that was stamped with StampinÂ’ Round Whirly Twirly and topped with stamped topper (see: Staff Appreciation cookie bag)
Friday was the Grand Finale - a lunch. The menu consisted of Lasagna, Caesar and Orange salads, garlic bread and fresh bread rolls, various cheesecake desserts and coffee and fruit punches. We made invitations and stamped placemats with Stampin Around Whirly Twirly. We had fruit themed napkins that matched. To finish it all off, the ea received a Post It note booklet as ‘party favor’.
The response was overwhelming - from tears to speechlessness. It made all the long hours of work worth it all (and believe me, tens of hours of work went into all this). Note to self though - NEXT TIME choose a theme where you can use stamps that DO NOT REQUIRE EXTENSIVE COLORING. I tried to do monochromatic cards - but it just didnÂ’t look as good, so I had to color 270 stamped images with blender pens. I made sure the committee made a note of this!
And thatÂ’s the whole scoop. Thanks for letting me share this with you!
Date: Sunday, April 24, 2005 GMT Views: 2102
Favorited:30
Registered: November 22, 2004 Location: New Plymouth, New Zealand Posts: 633
Mon, Apr 25, 2005 @ 1:46 AM
WOW - you're amazing. I can't even imagine how much the teachers are appreciating YOU right now! I love the quilt (and all the other ideas for that matter). Great job!!
------------------------------ School days are the happiest days of your life, provided of course, your kids are old enough to go!!
Registered: August 26, 2004 Location: Arkansas Posts: 4404
Mon, Apr 25, 2005 @ 7:23 AM
That is a wonderful card and a WONDERFUL thing you did for those teachers. You did a lot of HARD work. You are a great example of the "Fruits of the Spirit"!
Registered: November 9, 2004 Location: Boulder City, NV Posts: 786
Mon, Apr 25, 2005 @ 8:34 AM
Awesome task...and awesome results. What a lucky group of teachers to have such supportive AND creative parents. The "Fruits of the Spirit" are quite evident in these beautiful creations!
Registered: September 21, 2004 Location: SD Posts: 298
Mon, Apr 25, 2005 @ 10:40 AM
WOW what a wonderful treat for all who work at you school and what a beautiful job you did on all these nice gifts. Your coloring was well worth it!! - Amy
Registered: February 21, 2005 Location: Canada Posts: 9
Mon, Apr 25, 2005 @ 8:24 PM
Thank you everone for your kind words! I feel very blessed.
I had trouble uploading the rest of the pics. Rest of them should be available by tomorrow.
Blessings
Corn� du Preez
------------------------------ Proudly South African!!