Holiday Gift Guide - Christmas Cookies and Candies

One of my favorite gifts to share at the holidays are my homemade cookies. I enjoy making a variety of cookies and enjoy that I can give them as gifts to others. Each year I experiment with new recipes (this year, the new recipe was M&M Pretzel Bark. You can find many of the other recipes over on A Busy Mom of Two in the Kitchen). Assembled together on a plate (or in a bag), they are nice to share with others.

When it comes to neighbors and co-workers as a whole, my goal is to help spread holiday cheer. For my neighbors, I like to put together a small plate of baked goods to share with them. I drop them off along with the Christmas card. It allows for a quick visit, during the cold time of year where we tend to see less of each other because we aren't outside playing. I also like to take a large platter of baked goods to work to share with everyone (although, I find myself eating more than one!).

For the kids teachers, I know that they are getting a number of gifts and try to avoid filling their life with more clutter. When my kids were first in daycare, I struggled with what I was going to give their teachers, I have a friend who is a teacher and she said - no apples, no smelly stuff and no mugs. Okay, that helped narrow things down a bit, but I still wasn't sure what to give.

So, I thought, why not make a plate of tasty treats that they could eat or share with friends and family that visit during the holiday season. For the teachers I decided it would be better to give them a plate that they could use over and over again, instead of the typical paper plate I use when giving plates of cookies to neighbors. I headed out to the store and found some really cute little square plates.

They were winter themed, not just holiday themed. I piled them with our homemade holiday cookies and candies,

>placed them in food gift bags and tied them with a tag.

I got a nice of lot compliments and thank you notes from the teachers. I've had teachers who didn't have my kids express disappointment that they didn't have one of the kids in their class at Christmas, so they could get the holiday treats. Now that the kids are older, they help me with baking the cookies and making the candies. Which, of course, makes it an even better gift for them to give to their teachers, because they helped make it. Homemade treats and a fancy plate as a Christmas gift for teachers works for me.

I also have started to use treat bags to allow me to share more cookies with more people. It is great to get to bake (something I really enjoy) and to share with others (especially those that have expressed appreciation because they don't or don't have the time to bake).

This post shared at Works for Me Wednesday.