Scotland School Makes Holiday Gift-Giving Easy

By Rayda K. Krell, Scotland School Parent

            On Friday, November 22nd, Scotland Elementary School students had the opportunity to prepare for the holidays with two gift events at school. 

            During the day, the Gym was turned into a Holiday Boutique so that students could shop during recess.  Parent volunteers Kim Tuccio and Karen Weiskopf organized the event.  A variety of gifts were made available for kids to purchase and all gifts ranged from $1.00 to 5.00 each.  The Girl Scouts helped younger shoppers and additional volunteers were on-hand to wrap the gifts.    Many of the gifts were chosen to appeal to particular recipients, such as parents, grandparents, and pets!  For many families, the gifts that students shop for at school are among the most cherished.  It is unusual that kids have a chance to shop independently and the school’s Holiday Boutique gives them the opportunity.  Many parents look forward to receiving the gifts the students choose because they are some of the few gifts that are truly a surprise.

            The Holiday Boutique was followed by an evening Holiday Craft Night organized by parents Megan Silliman and Jean Macaluso. Students chose and paid for their crafts in advance and each student could choose to make three different crafts.  The crafts included decorating a glass vase, decorating a mug, painting a canvas, making a penguin holiday ornament, making tile coasters, decorating picture frames or aprons, and making snowmen out of socks filled with rice.  It was an extremely successful event with the cafeteria full of families for most of the evening.  Parents were thrilled with quality of the crafts and the kids had fun being creative and thinking about who would receive each handmade gift.  It was a very successful gift day at Scotland.  The parents will have some catching up to do on black Friday!