Grown-Up Valentine

Dear Husband, if you have opened this post STOP NOW, shut your eyes and back away from the computer!  

OK, now that that is taken care of...I wanted to share the really fun grown-up Valentine I have made for my husband.  And as I have shared in the past, Valentine's Day is not only love day for everyone but it is also my husband and mine dating anniversary.  Yup, this February 14th my man and I have been in love for 12 years.  WOW!  So I wanted to come up with a Valentine / Anniversary Gift that wrapped all that up in one.  And I think I did it with this card / art I made at PicMonkey.

As you can see the background is a map of Colorado featuring Boulder,which is where my husband and I met.

I printed it on glossy card stock and plan to frame it.  From there I'm thinking it would look great in our upstairs family gallery wall.  But of course it is his gift so he can put it were he wants.  (Stop laughing, that is kinda true!)

This is also an easy idea for just a card (doesn't have to be framed).  So if you want to make one yourself follow this link to my PicMonkey Card How To.  And where did I get the map?  Google Images!

Easy Valentines

"Love Day" as my daughter calls it, is right around the corner.  And for us this is our first year of having a class to give Valentine's to!  Now my daughter only has 8 kids in her class so the idea of making our own Valentines isn't that overwhelming.  I understand it may be a bit different if your kiddos have 25 kids in their class.  But this is a really simple project that you can get the kids working on and you probably have most of what you need already at home.  

All you need is paper or cardstock, yarn, a hole punch and pens or crayons or stickers to decorate with.

Start out by making a heart template out of paper.  Fold a piece of paper in half, cut half a heart and open it up to have a full heart...you know how to do that.

Next use the template to cut out hearts.  You will need twice as many hearts as Valentines you want to make.  I cut 16 hearts to make 8 Valentines.

I used paper I already had in my craft supplies and decided to do solid paper on one side and a print on the other side, but this isn't necessary - just use what you've got.  You could even use paper bags or wrapping paper or gift bags.  This is a great project to recycle stuff around the house!

So now that you have cut all your hearts, put two together and start punching holes.  Do not punch holes in part of the top of the hearts because this is where you want to leave it open to create your pocket for candy or other little goodies.

Cut a long piece of yarn and lace it through the first hole and make a knot so it wont go anywhere.

From here let your kids take over.  My daughter loves her lacing game and that is all this is!  

Actually, her version looks more like this...

Tie off the yarn at the end and start decorating.  

You can write the kids name's on the Valentines, decorate with stickers or glitter or anything you would like.  Fill the Valentines with goodies and you are ready for Love Day!