Some Homemade and Yummy, Christmas gift Ideas

Last Christmas instead of doing tons of shopping for everyone, instead I made homemade gifts. 

I made homemade hot chocolate, then chocolate dipped spoons, to stir into the hot chocolate.  I also made homemade peppermint bark!

They were all a big hit, and everyone loved them!

Plus, it wasn't real expensive either.

For the hot chocolate, we purchased some inexpensive tins and some inexpensive coffee mugs.  (The mugs were $1 each, and the tins were maybe $1.50)

filled the tins with the cocoa, made some labels on the computer, and tied them to the tin with tiny ribbon.

I don't have any photos of my process of making the spoons, or the peppermint bark, because I lost a lot of files when our computer had a virus last spring. But here are a couple that my mother sent me of them sitting on her table.

 The peppermint bark

and then the peppermint bark along with some of the spoons:

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Here are some instructions to make each of the above: 

For the hot chocolate you will need:

10-2/3 cups nonfat dry powdered milk

6oz powdered nondairy creamer

4 cups powdered sugar

2 cups unsweetened cocoa powder

Combine all ingredients in a LARGE bowl, mix thorouly with a wisk. 

For a serving: 
3 tablespoons hot cocoa mix to 1 cup hot water, or I like to do about half water, and half milk.

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For the peppermint bark I had a large block of white chocolate that is for a fondue fountain.  You can also use white chocolate chips.
Then just melt the chocolate, crush up some peppermint candy canes and stir together.  Place in a try to cool. 
Once cool break apart. 

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 for the chocolate dipped spoons, I simply took some of my regular chocolate and some white chocolate, and melted it, then dipped my spoons in till they were nicely covered.   Then laid them out on wax paper.  I also sprinkled them with holiday sprinkles, but that is not neccesary. 

After they were cool, I cut small bits of saran wrap and wrapped the ends, then tied tiny bows with some ribbon to hold the wrap on the spoon.

Hope you got some good ideas from my article.

 Thanks for reading.