Teacher Appreciation Week Snack Bar

Wednesday we hosted a Teacher Appreciation Week snack bar. I had all of the circus theme decorations left over from this adorable baby shower we held for my niece.  I thought it would be fun to reuse the circus theme for a Teacher Appreciation Week Circus Treats station! If you’re just joining, see this post for the full week schedule of Teacher Appreciation Week activities and meals.

Teacher Appreciation Snack Bar Circus Decorations

I used a 100′ roll of red and white stripe plastic table cover for most of the decor. I cut 6 – 12′ lengths and gathered them at one end with clear packing tape. Then I lined them up end to end and taped them to the brick wall. Pulling three to each side and securing them with a turquoise tissue tassel created the Circus Tent backdrop. I also used the plastic table roll to cover the outsides of plain plastic bins for the popcorn and cotton candy.

The Circus themed cupcake stands and food trays really added to the decor as well! They are pretty sturdy so they can be used several times – huge bonus!

I re-purposed these signs from the baby shower and added cute teacher-related sayings to them.

Teacher Appreciation Week Snack Bar Circus Food

Anyone working with the PTA knows you are on a tight budget. We tried to squeeze every penny we could to offer as much as possible for the snack bar, but in the end I learned a few important lessons that I’ll share with you later.

We decided to offer the following Circus themed snacks:

20 Churros – Ordered from the Costco food court, cut into 6 sections with 3 sections per red treat cup (from Dollar Tree)
24 soft pretzels – we bought the frozen variety at Walmart and baked them in the staff lounge so they were nice and warm when the teachers arrived.
1 bag of Salt Water Taffy 3.5 lbs
4 bags of pink and white Circus Cookies
1 giant bag of Boom Chicka Pop Kettle (the Costco size)
1 giant bag of Skinny Pop (the Costco size)
3 types of cotton candy that I spun with my machine – Pina Colada, Grape and Vanilla

In total we had:

40 cups of churros served with Hershey’s chocolate syrup for dipping in 1 oz plastic shot glasses.

24 Soft Pretzels with mustard or cheese for dipping in 1 oz plastic shot glasses.

2 jars of Taffy with a metal 4 oz scoop.

1 jar of Circus Cookies with a metal 4 oz scoop.

50 bags of popcorn placed in 8 oz popcorn bags.

50 poufs of cotton candy in gallon size twist tie bags (they are much cheaper than the branded cotton candy bags).

HERE’S WHAT I LEARNED:

See, it get’s all capital letters because it’s so important! The teachers didn’t like that it wasn’t one of each item per person. Those who got there at the end when there weren’t any churros or pretzels left weren’t happy about that. So, next year I will offer fewer items and make sure there is one of each item for each person. That, or I should have put a sign out that said, “Please choose a churro OR a soft pretzel”. We had left overs of everything but those two items, which tells me they were the HOT items! See, now I can make next year even MORE amazing!