Celebrating Valentine's Day

I think that Valentine's Day is a pretty fun holiday - especially if you've got a house full of little girls (which I do).  Let's see... hearts, pink and red, sparkles, chocolate... yep that's right up our alley.

Here's what we've done to celebrate Valentine's Day so far:

Heart Themed Crafts

We've been doing lots of colouring of hearts - tracing them, painting them and colouring them in.

Decorating

I pulled out my Valentine's decorations from last year, and still like them.  I posted a picture of the felt heart wreath last year here, and the heart garland is made from felt heart shapes and ribbon.  The picture is of the Calgary Temple, taken by my lovely friend Laura.  And those snowy branches are from my sister's wedding reception last year.

 

 

Making Valentine's

 

 

My oldest is a planner.  Before February even hit, she was eager to start making Valentine's cards for her classmates.  I convinced her to make some to mail first, so we could wait for the list that the teacher sends home.  (There are a lot of names in her Kindergarten classroom with many spelling options).  I printed off these Cute As A Button cards.  My two year old had fun gluing on buttons, and my five year old, got much more creative.  For her classmates, M picked out these cards, and is drawing a picture on the back of each.  

 

 

Valentine's Party

 

 

As a reward for awesome behaviour, my five year old, earned a Valentine's party.  She got to invite four friends.  Oh, this party was the most talked about thing in our house for weeks!  On the menu we had mini heart shaped pizzas, strawberries, watermelon, veggies, and chocolate cupcakes.  We played some games, did a craft, and even had a wishing well, with a prize for each guest.  I gave M $5 to spend at the dollarstore and she had so fun fun picking out what she needed, and planning all of the activities.  The day of the party, my two year old was recovering from being sick, and things got a little crazy, so the camera only came out one time.  I can assure you the party was a good success, despite the lack of documentation.

 

 

 

I still have a few more Valentine's activities planned: heart shaped pancakes are a must, and we will also make a great Valentine for Daddy. 

 

How are you celebrating Valentine's Day?

 



Love Bags

The other day, my four year old suggested that we take some bags, put ornaments into them, and open one each morning.  (This was sounding very similar to my advent bags from Christmas.)  I wanted to support her idea (you can read my guest post on The Artful Parent to hear more about my philosophy on supporting kids' original ideas).  I suggested that instead of putting Christmas ornaments inside of the bags, we could put little presents for her Daddy.  She loved this idea, and immediately declared: "Yes!  And let's call them love bags because they'll be about how much we love Daddy!"

We decided to make ten bags, and put little drawings, candy and other surprises inside of each bag.  (When I was sewing the advent bags, I knew they could be multi-purpose!)  I made ten new labels for the bags to make them look less Christmas-y and more Love Bag-ish. 

My daughter is beyond excited to open a bag each morning with her Daddy.  She knows what is inside, and what's inside isn't that exciting (a stick of gum, or a stuffed Christmas bear, for example), but she is still so excited. 

Do you want to make your own Love Bags?  Check out my advent bags post, and then adapt for love.  I think it would be a really sweet thing to do for your husband, boyfriend, kids, etc.  You could write things you love about the person, put chocolates, or maybe even make little date certificates.  I would be excited to open a Love Bag every morning in the two weeks leading up to Valentine's Day.  Maybe if I give really big hints, someone will do it for me?  (Mr. Emily, are you reading this?)