a very encouraging gift.

I was looking for something personal and kind of sentimental for my mom's birthday this year, and morphed an idea I found on pinterest into this:

So your gift it/yummy monday idea is full of chocolate and mint.  If you know of someone who loves Andes chocolates, this may be just right for them!  It's super easy and comes together fast, as long as you've got the rest of the family's cooperation!

You'll need:
1-2 bags of Andes mints (how many you need depends on the age of your recipient)
pint or quart sized mason jar
washi tape
printable topper
double sided tape
twine
computer/printer

The first step is the most difficult - ha!  Email or call your whole family (whoever you want to include) and ask them to provide a list of the reasons they love your... whoever you're giving the gift to.  It may take a while to get a response!
The trick is to include as many responses as your recipient is old.  My mom was turning 62 so I needed 62 responses.
For my jar, I included my brothers and sister, their spouses and all the grandkids.  (Even my 10 month old provided an answer.)  I just had them each include as many as they wanted to and I made up the difference.
Once you've collected them all, type them up in a fun font leaving space between each one and print them out on normal paper.

Cut them apart so there is one response on each strip of paper.

Take a strip and wrap it around one mint, then secure with washi tape - make sure to put the tape not only on the strip of paper, but also on the mint itself to make sure the strip of paper doesn't slide off.

Then fill up your jar.  
One strip of paper and one piece of washi tape per mint.  

Once you're finished, punch out the circle tag and cut some twine.

Use double sided tape to secure the circle tag to the top of the lid.  Screw the ring around the jar and tie the twine in a knot around it.

Voila!

Now, when your mom (or whoever you're giving this to) has a hard day, they can pull out a mint and read why they are so very awesome.  I loved having the grandkids contribute... it made for a fun variety of answers!

If your recipient doesn't like andes mints, you could always do lifesavers mints or even mint gum!

Below are the gift tags, one in case your mom is also turning 62 and one where you can fill in the age yourself.

Of course, I completely forgot about the part where you might want to give this to someone who is NOT your mom, so there's no tag for that.  Whoops.

*Be sure to check below for all the fun parties I link to!*