I decided to package together not only the food gift (of apple butter and biscuits), but a small photo album showing the process from:

• the whole family picking the apples
• my daughter and I making the apple butter
• canning the apple butter
• the toddler twins making biscuits, including using holiday shaped cookie cutters to make biscuits shaped like stars, stockings, gingerbread men and Christmas trees

Granted, I happen to be strange and, even though I had this idea a couple weeks before Christmas, I already had photos of the process. But if you're a mom like me who documents what the kids do pretty much incessently, you are probably already in great shape to do this project.

Even if you didn't, there are lots of ways you can do this even late in the game. You will need:

• A food gift idea to make
• A small and inexpensive photo album (one with something like 24 pages, not the bigger 100-page versions) or small photo scrapbook if you would like to add captions to each picture
• Alternately, you could create a photo book at a store like CVS or online at various photo sites
• Ingredients for the food gift
• Kids to be cute and make it
• A camera
• Prints of the pictures you take

Since Christmas is almost here, you might think it's too late. It isn't. Here are some quick turn-around food gifts you and the kids can make and you can capture in images:

• Christmas cookies
• Chocolate truffles
• Candies
• Biscuits
• Biscotti
• Various food mixes in a jar
• Pretty much any food gift that can be made in an afternoon.