Question, Wreath and Freebie!

First up, a quick question. As you probably remember, I teach in a Title I school where the majority of my kiddos live in poverty. I hear stories about water or electricity being turned off, items getting hocked, children not having heat/food/clothes at home. Of course the school helps out where it can, but money is still tight for the majority of these families. That being said, on Friday I looked in my box and found a stack of flyers for a "Breakfast with Santa" that was being put on by our local pizza/video games place. For $15 per person you got some breakfast pizza, cinnamon rolls and drinks. If you brought in a canned food item for the food bank, you got a free picture with Santa. I was absolutely floored. First, aside from the Food Bank item, this was not a charity event, but a for-profit event for the pizza place - why were we providing them with a free advertising audience?! Secondly - at $15 a person (even kids!) maybe about 5% of our school population would be able to go. I thought of my firsties taking this paper home and asking mom and dad if they could please go eat breakfast with Santa, and then I thought about those moms and dads having to say no because they didn't have the $ to go. I ended up throwing out  the whole stack of papers rather than handing them out. Some of the other teachers said that I didn't have the right to decide that my students' families couldn't afford to go, and that I should send out the flyers so that those who could afford it had the opportunity. So, my question is - what would you have done? Do you think I was out of line throwing the papers away?


Next up - a quick tutorial on my first burlap wreath! I made it for my Secret Santa at school - she's not a computer person, so I think I'm safe posting this :) Our big gift exchange isn't until Friday, so I'm actually ahead of schedule for once! I was inspired by this wreath by Just Sew Sassy, but I put a little bit of my own spin on it.This was really easy and quick - no sewing involved, which is the only reason I even attempted this, and it turned out so well that I am going to be making another one for my own front door this week. My only warning is that it is a bit messy, well, actually, it's a lot messy, but as long as you don't mind having to thoroughly vacuum whatever room you make this in, you'll be fine. As soon as I pulled out the burlap my husband advised me to make the wreath in the garage, but as it's unheated and the temperature is only 30 degrees today, I vetoed that suggestion!
Here is my finished wreath:

 I started with a 10inch straw wreath and about 1/2 yard of burlap in green, red and white. You'll also need large headed straight pins. Cut your burlap into 4x4 inch squares - since I'm so impatient, I stopped measuring about halfway through and just started guesstimating - as long as it's in the vicinity of 4x4 it works fine :)
Next you're going to take a square of burlap and fold it in half so it forms a triangle.
Then, tuck the remaining outer corners in between the middle point, so it forms a sort of pocket or square bubble.
Use your straight pins to pin each bubble to the straw wreath. I started pinning on the inside of the wreath and wrapped around towards the back of it. I chose to do an ABC pattern, but you could do blocks of each color or just do a scattered look as well.
Don't worry too much about loose threads or such, it's pretty easy to trim it up at the very end. Once you have a full wreath, you can go back and pin down any loose corners I hung mine up to see if there were any areas I wanted to repin or add in another square.

And finally - the aftermath:
But, I really think that the wreath was worth the time and effort to make it, and clean up afterwards!


Finally, a quick freebie for those of you who like to graph with food! I love using cereal/candy/marshamllows etc to graph with, so when I saw this box of Cap'n Crunch Holiday Edition cereal I had to throw together a graph for it! I do advise you to sort the cereal into baggies beforehand so you can sort out any broken pieces and make sure you get enough of the "special" pieces for each child!
Crunch Graph

9 comments:

Erika said...

Before you even said that you had tossed the flyers, I was thinking I would throw them away or put them in the recycling bin. I've made that kind of decision in the past and I've never regretted it! Good for you.
2B Honey Bunch

Erika said...

Oh, and the wreath is awesome!
2B Honey Bunch

Erika said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Miss Nguyen's Class said...

Where did you buy the cereal at? I have been looking EVERYWHERE and can't seem to find any in seattle!

Jennifer K. said...

@Miss Nguyen's Class

I'm in Oklahoma, but I was shopping at our Commissary on base. I hope you can find some in your area!

Jennifer

Jennifer K. said...

@Erika

Thanks Erica! I was kind of surprised that no one else at school seemed to find it wrong to send that home, but then again, I don't think most of them read what goes out anyways!

Jennifer

Kinder Kiddo said...

We have this discussion ALL the time. I'm all for promoting our community, buying locally, yada yada, but like you said, some of the kiddos' families can't afford all of it. We hand out pizza coupons all the time for kids, but I mean the parents have to take them there and pay for their meal. On a good note, your wreath is soooo cute!

Kerri Buckner said...

I would have probably thrown them out too. I hate some of the stuff we send home. Most of the time parents don't read what I send home that's important so why add to it. I love your wreath and want to make one now. Thanks for the tutorial.

Unknown said...

I am guilty of throwing away something I knew would stress out parents and upset kids...I know it isn't my place, but I had a really good feel for the outcome. I tucked it in the back of two kid's folders but the rest never saw it....I have only done it once. :(
LOVE the WREATH!!!! I love burlap too and I can't sew so it's just perfect!!!

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