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Grab an inexpensive plastic beach shovel, fill with a treat, and attach this FREE Printable tag from it is what it is.

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A Krazy Straw and a Kool Aid packet is just the perfect summer gift when paired with the above FREE Printable tag from A Cupcake for the Teacher.

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Family Fun shows you how to whip together a batch of School of Fish Cupcakes for your Happy Buddy’s classmates to  celebrate the end of a great year.

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Katherine Marie had her Happy Buddies put together these beary sweet snacks for their classmates.

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Package up some bouncy balls with this great FREE Printable from Dixie Delights.

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Or a summer favorite – beach balls (I saw a bunch in the Target Dollar Bins yesterday).

Attach this FREE Printable from Tami Wilson Photographyand your friends will all be beach ready!

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It’s easy to find a box of chalk on the cheap.  Include a note that says, “Chalk it up to another great year!” and you’ve got a gift that will last your Happy Buddy’s classmates all summer long.

Go to Pink Peppermint Blogger for this and other Summer Fun Gift Ideas.

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And last but not least…

To Be Charmed made a super fun FREE Printable that you can wrap around mini Hershey’s bars.

Whatever you choose, your Happy Buddy’s classmates are going to love their new summer loot!

Happy End of School Year Gift Idea-ing!

*See Part 1 End of School Year Gift Ideas for Teachers HERE!^

Go out with a BANG using one of these simple End of School Year Gift Ideas for your Happy Buddy’s TEACHER…

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Grab a cute notepad and attach this FREE Printable tag from Mommy By Day Crafter By Night for a sweet end of year surprise.

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Vintage Umbrella bought a package of highlighters and spiffed it up with happy ribbon and a cute saying.

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The Busy Budgeting Mama added the tag above to a movie theater gift card as a creative way to say thanks.I think this End of Year Candy Gram is A-W-E-S-O-M-E.

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What parent doesn’t have a million bags of goldfish crackers hanging around?

Package up a few handfuls and include this sweet note from Lauren McKinsey Designs.

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Or use this FREE Printable tag from The Hip Momma’s Journal to attach to a bag of cookies or even a jar of homemade!

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Store and Style picked up an inexpensive pair of flip flops and included a handmade card with a gift card for a pedicure.

How cute is that???

Any teacher would love to get her toes done for summer shoe season.

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Do you remember the Teacher Survey I posted about at the beginning of the year?

You can use the answers you got from that to fill up a simple brown paper package like Counting Our Blessings.

I just looooove stuff like that – a whole bag full of favorite things!!!

Ooo, if I were to receive a bag like that it’d have the Happy Baby in it along with a hundred bags of chocolate granola.

And tickets to Disney because when life gets tough that’s the place I want to escape to!

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Rachel Berry loaded her Happy Buddies’ teachers up with all of the ingredients for this quintessential summer treat.

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This Summer Relaxation Kit from The Lovely Cupboard couldn’t be more perfect!

Any teacher deserves a kit like this to help them kick back and enjoy the stress-free days of summer.

So easy and inexpensive to make – everything you see in the photo came from Wal-Mart!

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Finally, I say it all the time, but the BEST gift you can give a teacher is a handwritten note.

Lil’ Blue Boo makes it easy with this FREE Printable Fill-In-The-Blank Teacher Thank You Card.

Need some more End of School Year Teacher Gift Ideas?  Check out THIS FABULOUS ARTICLE featuring 10 perfect ideas that were created based on the feedback of actual teachers.

Come back tomorrow for an awesome post revealing my favorite End of School Year Gift Ideas for your Happy Buddies to pass out to their friends!

Happy End of School Year Gift Idea-ing!

The Happy Hubby is actually a graduate himself this year – May 18th my man will be walking across the platform to receive his Masters of Divinity!

Seriously, with all that we have going on right now, he still wrote two 20-page papers dissecting a piece of Scripture – in GREEK, no less – and turned them in on time so that he can get his diploma along with the rest of his class.

I am so proud of him.

So proud that I am trying to come up with a great gift idea to celebrate all that he has accomplished in the last 6 years of seminary.

Who doesn’t like getting cash as a gift?

But stuffing an envelope with a couple of twenties just doesn’t cut it for this Happy Home Fairy.

So here are some Creative Money Gifting Ideas that any Graduate would love!

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I did this fun idea last year for a gal I knew who was graduating from high school.

She laughed and laughed about it!

Check out the idea over at Create My Event.

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I love this fabulous Money Lei from Your Homebased Mom.

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You could take this Christmas Money Jar idea found HERE and just change the tag!

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Or, instead of a jar, carefully cut an opening in the back of an empty 2-liter soda bottle, insert candy and money, then close and cover with scrapbook paper in the graduate’s school colors.

Read more about this clever idea at Nancy’s Craft Spot.

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Crafts Unleashed transformed a simple box into a graduation cap!

Roll up money like tiny diplomas and line them inside the box for a happy surprise.

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(Every)Nothing Wonderful shows you how to insert money into a bar of soap (not as hard as you’d think!) to encourage graduates to stay on top of showering once they leave home.

Sounds like good clean fun to me!

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A neat birthday gift, but also works great for grads, Making Memories with Your Kids made this fun Money in a Can gift that allows the recipient to pull out a whole chain of dollar bills.

How magical that the cash just keeps coming and coming!

OR, take this same idea but stick the roll of bills in an empty tissue box.  Include a note that says, “Don’t BLOW it all in one place!”

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Now this is genius!

The Seasonal Home bought an inexpensive umbrella from the dollar store and dangled bills from the inside so that when the graduate opened it up – tada!

A little something for a rainy day…

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Increasingly Domestic hangs balloons with dollar bills inside for each year of her Happy Buddy’s lives on their birthdays.

How cool to get to pop balloons and have money fall out on you?

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And, finally, I just loooove how awesome and creative this Box of Chocolates Money is from Life As Mom.

Are you trying to think of a graduate whom you can bestow a little dough with one of these fantastic ideas???

The Happy Hubby would be a happy recipient – haha!

Happy Money Gift-ing!

*Come to think of it, these ideas would also work great as End of Year Teacher Gifts or Birthday presents!*

I never really thought about the hundreds of mommies who end up there as well.

Some with preemies, some with health complications like us, and some… some who never even get to take their baby home.

There’s Kristen and Patrick who had their twins at 24 weeks.

Sadly, Jackson did not make it, but his brother Wesley is hanging on at 2 lbs 2 oz.

Kristen comes to visit the Happy Baby and me and she is always smiling – always hopeful for her little man.

Then there’s Dareen who had triplets at 28 weeks.

Dareen who is there all day, every day, standing over her buddies’ isolets and willing them to get through yet another surgery.

Finally, there’s LaShay.

LaShay and her little Prince Kendrick who one day seems to take two steps forward and then the next day two steps back.

LaShay and Kendrick have been in the NICU since January.

These 3 mommies share a commonality.

They are warriors.

They are fighting a battle with an unknown end.

But they have not lost hope – not given up.

Because life is something to fight for.

When you’re in a battle like this day in and day out, sometimes you just need a little something to lift the burden.

A little lemonade, shall we say.

So here is the card I made and handed out to all the NICU mommies on Mother’s Day.

Maybe you can share it with a NICU Mommy you know.“Be strong and courageous.  Do not be afraid, for the Lord your God is with you wherever you go.” Joshua 1:9

To all the Warrior NICU Mommies out there – Jesus Loves You!

The teacher took me aside and gently told me the ways in which I had failed to complete the assignment and I began crying enough tears to fill a swimming pool.

But as I sat there with my cheeks all wet and thinking that I would never be asked to move up to the 11th grade, my teacher (who happens to be a famous author and blogs over HERE) said that she would let me have a second chance.

If I redid the assignment correctly, she’d toss the other paper and it would all be like a bad dream.

Second chances…

When we got pregnant with the Happy Baby one thing that kept marching through my brain was this thankful spirit that the Lord was giving me a second chance.

You see, with the Happy Buddy, I was a hot mess the whole first year of his life.

I fretted constantly about his growth (is he gaining enough??), his nursing (what if my milk supply dwindles and I have to put him on formula?!), his schedule (I can’t possibly go to church today because it might interfere with his nap), his health (did that stranger really just kiss my baby on the cheek?!), his pacis falling on the floor (I wonder what kind of deadly disease is now lingering on that MAM), his diaper rashes (should I be doing cloth diapers?), his first foods (is he going to die if I don’t feed him organic?), his sleeping (will he remember that we let him cry-it-out and hold it against us forever?), his playing (why hasn’t he rolled over yet?  So-and-so-friend’s baby is practically walking already!), what kind of soap I used for his baths (I’d never read ingredient labels for soap until I had a kid)…

But then I worried about bigger issues, too (hello vaccinations).  Almost to a point where I felt paralyzed by the fear.

The fear that I would make a decision and somehow ruin the Happy Buddy forever.

By the time the Happy Buddy turned one I looked back and felt kind of sick to my stomach that I had missed out somehow.

I had spent so much time being anxious that I don’t fully remember the moments where I just plain enjoyed his sweet baby-ness.

I could not wait to get a do-over.  Another baby that I could say, “Eat artificially colored M&M’s and greasy pizza for all I care, just let me kiss those chubby cheeks a hundred million times a day.”

Naturally, when the Happy Baby arrived and before I could even kiss his precious cheeks twice the doctors were whisking him away uttering phrases like, “It could go either way…”, I had the thought What about my second chance?

And then the days turned into weeks and suddenly the fears I had about the Happy Buddy seemed kind of silly in light of the obstacles the Happy Baby was already facing at the beginning of his life.

Suddenly I didn’t care so much that the NICU uses Johnson & Johnson soap for bath times.

Suddenly I didn’t care so much when the doctor said they needed to start adding formula to my breastmilk because he’s breathing so fast and burning so many calories he needs the extra boost to help him grow.

Suddenly vaccinations seemed like a walk in the park when we were faced with the decision to put the Happy Baby on chemotherapy-powered drugs for 6 long weeks to try and fight this virus.

Suddenly the things I am anxious about are more about how no one is there to hold him in the middle of the night, respond to his every cry, stroke his hair back, turn his mobile on, or hold his paci in place for hours at a time just because it makes him happy.

And when I am with him, I study every single God-painted feature on his sweet little face is and consider how precious each of his tiny toes and fingers are.

I drink in his smell, thank Jesus for every diaper change, and cherish the feel of his peach-fuzzed earlobes.

I hold him and sing to him and find peace in the moment that is ours.

When I am with the Happy Baby there is no time to think about the long-term consequences of all that he’s endured the last 5 weeks.

Because I’ve learned that I have no control over the outcome of the Happy Baby’s life.

No amount of organic food I ate during my pregnancy could have made a difference in how the Lord designed the Happy Baby and this season of our lives right now.

With the Happy Buddy I had let my pride rule my faith – bearing this unnecessary, strangling burden for every single decision.

Jesus says parenting is a whole lot easier than that (check out Matthew 11:30).

Now don’t get me wrong.

I am not saying to throw all caution to the wind and let your child eat chicken nuggets, fries, and chocolate milk every day (although if your baby is in the NICU for an extended period of time, this action might be unavoidable), stay up late every night, and exist without any boundaries whatsoever.

I am also not bashing my sweet cloth diapering or organic-food-growing friends.  I’d totally do cloth if I wasn’t so addicted to convenience and I try to buy organic whenever our budget allows.

You must find what’s best for your Happy Home (and never judge another Happy Home that may choose to do things differently than you).

What I am saying is that while making well-educated, prayerful choices for our children is super important (you can bet the Happy Hubby and I have been on our knees about every little thing we’ve chosen to pursue concerning the Happy Baby’s health), when we let ourselves be overwhelmed by the responsibility, we take our eyes off of Christ and the very fact that our kids are not our own.

They belong to Him.

We are not in control.

This is the second chance I have been given.

To choose to treasure the time I do have with my baby – however long it may be – and not be afraid of what the future holds.

Because He is God’s child.

A child who was fearfully and wonderfully made by the very hands of Christ, who had all the days ordained for him written in His book before one of them came to be (Psalm 139).

A child who is covered by the promise that God has good plans for his life – plans to prosper him and not to harm him.  Plans to give him hope and a future (Jeremiah 29:11).

And I’m pretty sure that whether or not he wears cloth diapers is going to change that.

“Trust in the Lord with all your heart

and lean not on your own understanding;

in all your ways acknowledge him,

and he will make your paths straight.

Do not be wise in your own eyes;

fear the Lord and shun evil.

This will bring health to your body

and nourishment to your bones.”

Proverbs 3:5-8

*Update – God has blessed us with good progress this week!  The doctor took the Happy Baby’s Superhero Hat away (phew) and he is now on a high air flow machine.  We are praying that he will be weaned of that soon.  He continues to seem stronger each day – a credit to our great God.  Next week they will repeat the swallow test to see if he is strong enough to nurse/take a bottle again (please pray for victory in that!).  We are also waiting on some test results in order to move forward with a diagnosis.  Thank you, everyone, for your prayers and support.  I am eternally grateful for the strength your faith has given mine!*

I grabbed 5 cartons of those beautiful, fat, juicy red fruits and then felt inspired to do a post featuring all things strawberry!

Here are the berry best ideas I found…

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With Teacher Appreciation Week starting on Monday, here is one more super cute FREE Printable and idea from eighteen25 using some fresh picked items from Bath and Body Works.

Psst!  This FREE Printable also has a version for moms for Mother’s Day!

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Speaking of Mother’s Day, here is a precious Strawberry Mother’s Day Card from All Kids Network that uses your Happy Buddy’s fingerprints as the strawberry seeds.

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Or transform your Happy Buddy’s handprint into a strawberry like this one from Meet the Dubiens.

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I love this Scented Button Strawberry from itmom because once you have painted the strawberry on white cardstock, you get to sprinkle strawberry Jell-O or Kool Aid powder on top!  Yum!

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This clever Strawberry Necklace from Parents is made from a WALNUT (how cool is that?!) and just two other supplies.

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Surprise your Happy Buddies after school this month with these cute Strawberry Mice Snacks from Family Fun.

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People.

Have you ever tasted a Strawberry Pretzel Salad?

I made this a few months ago for our MOMs group at church and I had a flood of emails practically before the meeting was over begging me for the recipe (you can find it HERE)!

This is the perfect thing to carry to a Spring picnic or Summer BBQ.

OR check out this DELICIOUS Strawberry Trifle Recipe that  I made for my mom last Mother’s Day, as well as this addictive Strawberry Salad Recipe.

Thanks for PICKING Happy Home Fairy as one of the blogs you read!

I think y’all are BERRY sweet.

Happy Strawberry Idea-ing!

He is weaned off of oxygen (yay!) but he still needs a lot of pressure blown into his lungs to help them fully inflate (thus that crazy looking tube thing on his head.  I wept the first time I saw him wearing it!  But now I refer to it as his Superhero Hat.  All superheroes wear something on their heads, right??).

The medicine he is taking for the virus is working so far!  His blood work shows that the virus levels have dropped considerably.

But… he is still having breathing issues.

And because of his rapid breathing, the doctors do not want him to nurse or use a bottle for fear that he might aspirate and develop pneumonia.

Thus that tube-y thing coming out of his mouth.

SO.

There are still a lot of unanswered questions.

Every day is a bit of a roller coaster.

But we are trusting in Jesus.

We are clinging to His Word.

And believing that this little guy is going to have an uber awesome ministry one day as he shares how God SAVED his life – in more ways than one.

Much love and thanks,

Julie

“He will call on me, and I will answer him;
    I will be with him in trouble,
    I will deliver him and honor him.
With long life I will satisfy him
    and show him my salvation. ”

Psalm 91:15-16

People have literally been bringing us like five-course meals EVERY DAY since the Happy Baby was born.

Food falls out on us when we open the fridge door.

When David spoke in the 23rd Psalm that his “cup overflows” he was saying that God’s provisions for his life were of great abundance.

Not only was his cup (his life) full of provisions, but it overflowed with them.

Our Happy Home fridge is a reminder of His faithful provisions.

That even though we are walking through a pretty dark valley right now, we have this great hope that He will never leave us to want.

We come to Him humbly each day, hungry for His comfort and presence, and He feeds us until we are more than satisfied.

“He has filled the hungry with good things…” Luke 1:53

Thank you to all of our sweet friends who have brought us food and helped us call to mind the great goodness of our God.

(But if you could please stop sending brownies, then maybe my waistline wouldn’t overflow out of my jeans.  That I find harder to praise God about.)

Here are Happy Home Fairy’s Top 8 Favorite Ideas on how to bless your Happy Buddy’s teacher during the week of May 7-11, 2012.

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Tatertots and Jello put together a happy looking package featuring a Jamba Juice giftcard and clever FREE PRINTABLE tag.

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I love the sweet sentiment Little Pumpkin Grace added to a pot of flowers for her Happy Buddy’s teacher.

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Here’s an ad-mitt-edly simple Teacher Appreciation Gift from Somewhat Simple!

Grab an oven mitt, fill it with school supplies, attach a note that reads, “I have to ad-MITT, you are a great teacher!”, and voila!

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If you have time this week, pop by the school and take pictures of each student in the class holding letters that spell an encouraging message.

Then you can put them all together to create a wonderful keepsake!

Tutus and Turtles used Photoshop to create the print you see above.

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I LOVE this hilarious and easy to put together Teacher’s First Aid Kit from Pioneer Party and Gift.

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I giggled out loud when I read this FREE PRINTABLE tag from Detail-Oriented Diva.

Attach to a box of Krispy Kremes and you’re guaranteed to make any teacher’s day awesome.

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The gals over at eighteen25 provide you with another fabulous FREE PRINTABLE that you can stick in a pretty frame and help teachers build anticipation in their classrooms for the summer!

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Two Busy Blondes gave their teachers some muffins with a note that said, “There’s MUFFIN like a great teacher!”

Plus, they have a neat tutorial on how to transform an egg carton into the perfect muffin carrier.

**BONUS IDEA ALERT!**

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Holy cow, if my students had given me THIS for Teacher Appreciation Week, I would have died and gone to heaven!

I have a bit of a passion for glitter.

Find the simple instructions over at Smilemonsters.

But, in all honesty, the BEST gift you can give your Happy Buddy’s teacher next week is a heartfelt note expressing your gratitude for all his/her hard work in helping your child be the best he or she can be.

Happy Teacher Appreciate-ing!

*Find my other Teacher Appreciation Ideas HERE!*

Because after reading the comments I wrote on my therapeutic chocolate indulgences…

These two bags were swiftly delivered into my hands.

OHHHH dear friends.

Have you ever heard of People Chow?

It’s as close to heaven as crunchy chocolate snacks get.

Here is the recipe.

People Chow

Ingredients:

• 1/2 cup butter
• 2 cups chocolate chips
• 1 cup peanut butter
• 2 cups powdered sugar
• 12 cups Rice Chex cereal (or anything crunchy)

Directions:

1.  Melt butter, chocolate chips, and peanut butter on low heat.

2.  Mix in crunchy stuff.

3.  Pour mixture into a brown paper bag.

4.  Sprinkle with powdered sugar and shake it, shake it, shake it.

5.  Put in the freezer until hard.

6.  Eat and enjoy!!!

I guarantee that if you are going through a tough time, this stuff will help take the edge off – at least a little bit.

Now I am off to take one of my giant People Chow Ziplocs with me to the hospital to share with the nurses.

It’s dangerous having too much of it around.

Happy People Chow-ing!