Back to School Apple and Caramel Teacher Gift

My boys have been in school for a full week now. It doesn't seem like the summer should be over yet, but it is and we are slowly getting back into the groove of school and homework and lots of school papers. If you have been around my blog long, you know that I love to send little happies to my boys' teachers throughout the year just to let them know how much we appreciate all they do. So the boys ended their first week of school by taking their teachers these cute and {oh so simple} Back to School Apple and Caramel Teacher Gifts!

I looked all over the internet and Pinterest trying to find a quick and easy recipe for caramel dip. There are a ton of recipes out there, but the best one I found came for the adorable Alisa at The Sweet Life. It is so simple that it only calls for two ingredients: store bought caramels and a can of sweeten condensed milk!

The original recipe called for a bag of caramel bits, but our local grocery store didn't have them so we improvised a little. We used two small bags of caramel squares, and I'm pretty sure one big bag would be fine in this recipe too. I got a little assistance unwrapping all those caramel squares from two very excited helpers:)

Then I opened up this can of deliciousness and tried not to eat the whole thing with a spoon before it made it into my recipe!

I put the two ingredients into a microwave safe bowl, gave them a little stir, and then heated it in one minute intervals until it was melty and combined.

I poured the caramel dip into cute half pint mason jars. One batch of this caramel dip was just enough to fill four of this size jar.

I let the caramel cool a little, then I placed it in the bottom of a clear gift bag. I topped it off with a pretty red apple and tied the whole thing off with a little bit of raffia. You could tie on a cute tag, but we were running out of time and I thought it was plenty cute enough even without a tag!

This is a fun way to say thanks to your kiddo's teacher for all their hard work, and it's a great way to give that quintessential apple gift to the teacher without being just a boring old apple!

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Back to School Apple Waffles

August means back to school time around here...and back to school time means I plenty of excuses to make fun foods and crafts for my boys and their classes! Apples are one of the first things I think about when I think about back to school, so I figured what would be a better back to school breakfast than apple waffles?!? The fun thing about these yummy Back to School Apple Waffles is that they not only look like an apple, but they {sort of} taste like on too!

Start with a waffle mix, two apples, red food coloring, and a handful of gummy worms. I also ended up using a pretzel for the stem but it didn't make it into the first picture:)

First peel and grate your apples. I used two Granny Smith apples because that is what we had, but you can use any kind and any amount that you would like.

Mix your waffle batter according to the directions on the box, then toss in the grated apple pieces.

Add in a pretty good amount of red food coloring and stir.

{I totally forget to take a picture after I added the red food coloring, so just pretend this is just a picture of waffle batter with red food coloring instead of being a picture of red and green batter from when I made Watermelon Waffles last year!}

After your waffle is cooked and cooled a little, you can add the fun embellishments to make it look like an apple. I added a broken piece of pretzel for the stem, a small piece of green gummy worm for the leaf, and then best part: a yummy gummy worm coming out of one of the waffle holes:)

So if you are looking for a fun and sort of healthy {remember all that grated apple we added} breakfast to whip up for your kiddos on the first day of school {or maybe the fourth day like us}, try out these yummy Back to School Apple Waffles!

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Tatertots and Jello

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