Cub Scout Leader Gift Idea

Cub Scout leaders don't volunteer for the recognition, but it's nice to know that your efforts are appreciated.  As the Pack Committee Chair, I wanted to give each of our leaders and committee members a lasting but inexpensive gift.

After searching the internet, I decided to make these personalized mugs by using vinyl, a Cricut cutting machine, and glass etching cream.

 

 I found these vases/glasses at the Dollar Tree in the floral section.  They would work great on a desk to hold pencils, candy, paper clips, change, etc.  Of course, you could use any kind of glass container. I did consider using more of a traditional flower vase.  Since I have both male and female leaders and committee members, these made a nice unisex gift, however.

One of the symbols of Scouting is the fleur de lis, and I thought it would be a nice reminder of their Cub Scout days. I used the Cricut Cupcake Wrappers cartridge which has a fleur de lis cupcake topper. I had to play around with the size a bit to find the one I wanted.  I used some scrap paper to cut out the samples rather than wasting the vinyl.

After cutting a sheet of vinyl, I used a craft knife to cut around the symbols because I needed the outline.  Carefully pull the stencil off the backing and place it on the glass.  Make sure that the vinyl adheres to the glass, especially around the edges of the symbol.

Working with etching cream was new for me, but it was very easy.  Two tricks that I learned are that you need to put a thick layer of the cream on the glass and your brush strokes should go the in the same direction.  Leave it on 15 minutes and rinse off!

I put a piece of blue tissue paper inside of each container and filled it with candy.  Using a tag-shaped paper punch, I made yellow card stock tags, I wrote each leader's name on them.

Our pack purchases service star pins for our leaders that have a number indicating the number of years that the leader has volunteered.  I affixed these pins to the tags.

By etching the vases, adding the candy and personalizing the presentation of the service star pins, these inexpensive glass containers were a nice Cub Scout leader gift idea! I think I'll do something similar as teacher appreciation gifts.

Do you give your volunteers appreciation gifts?  What do you give?

Yours in Scouting,
Sherry

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