First Day of School

So my daughter, Cecilia aka CiCi, has started preschool.  I totally would have posted this earlier, but you know I had all that computer trouble around the same time! :(

So a little back story, I grew up in Germany.  My mother is full German and I spent my first 9 years or so in Germany.  Over there they have this awesome tradition for children and their first day of school.  It's called a Schultute!  Basically it's a decorated cone that's filled with candy and goodies so that they feel better about going to their first day of school, which can be filled with anxiety.

I absolutely love this tradition and had to do it for my own daughter, even though she was super excited about going to school! :)  I found this cute blog post with cute instructions on how to do it, but I'm also going to show you what I did!

What You'll Need:

• Poster Board

• Wrapping Paper or other decorations

• Scissors

• Hot Glue and/or good glue stick

• Tissue Paper or Fabric

• String

• Fillers (like candy, school supplies, etc.)

First you'll need to cut your poster board so that it can become a cone.  How large you want it is up to you, but I made mine pretty large because I had some big items.  Place your poster vertically in front of you to measure it out. To get the rounded edge I used a string and a pencil.  I held one end of the string in my right hand with a pencil and placed it at the bottom right hand corner you see in the photo. I pulled the other end of the string out to the bottom left hand corner of the poster in the photo.  Holding the string tight, I keep the left hand in the corner and draw my pencil up and around to the upper left side of the poster, like in the photo.  Then cute along this line to get the final product.

I then used my poster to trace my wrapping paper and cut it out as well.  Using a glue stick or hot glue, glue the wrapping paper down to the poster.

Use your hot glue to glue the two long edges together.  You might need some extra hands or a clip to help hold it in place while you glue.  Make sure it's holding together really well because you don't want it to come apart when you put your goodies inside.

Glue your tissue paper or fabric to the top.  To make sure it goes all around nicely, you'll want to overlap it and bunch it up.  This makes it easy for the kids to open and get inside, as well as not ripping any tissue paper used.  

You could take the decorating one step further and put ribbon around the top edge, maybe make the cone look like your child's favorite character, or put their name on it with pretty craft letters.  The possibilities are endless.  Next year I really want to make another one for my daughter and then I will probably make it into a character.

So, now you fill it with goodies.  I filled mine with lots of candy, as well as a coloring book, stickers, number magnets, number flash cards, light up bracelets, and hair-ties.  Traditionally it's filled with all candy, but you can fill it with whatever you like, even all school supplies.

My daughter loved it.  (Sorry for the blurry pic, but I had a hard time getting my daughter to be still, LOL!)

So, hopefully you can use this, but I'm sure many kids already started school, so maybe next year?  I plan on making one of these for my daughter for a few more years, though they will be smaller and smaller, hehe!  I hope you like this post! ;)