Valentine's ABC and 123

Anna is all about Valentine's day this year.  She asks me almost every day if it's Valentine's yet....or if tomorrow will be Valentine's.  I'm not really sure why...we don't really do anything special.  Right now, she is obsessed with this heart punch I have.  She punches hearts all day, draws pictures on them, writes "I love u" on them, colors them, gives them to us.....

So today, I thought we would do a little "heart learning".  I punched out enough hearts for both uppercase/lowercase letters, as well as numbers 1-5.

We played a matching/memory game with our letters..

We sorted them out by upper/lower case and then matched up the "baby" (lowercase) with the "momma" (uppercase) letters.

And then we matched up the correct number of hearts with each number.

It was fun...she was learning...and I'm sure we will do this again soon!

Making Heart Faces - Toddler Craft

This is the last heart related activity....I promise!! 

These were just too cute not to share!

Nothing says "love" like a heart smiley face!

Heart Butterfly Craft

This is a fun Valentine's craft we did earlier this week.  Like all our crafts, super easy!!

Supplies needed:

Cardstock of various colors

Scissors

Googly eyes

Glue

Popsicle sticks

Cut out large and small hearts from cardstock.

Glue your popsicle stick down on your paper and then add glue to the pointy end of your heart.

Glue the pointy end of the hearts together (to make a butterfly shape) and then glue on your small hearts onto the larger hearts.

Add the googly eyes and draw on your antennae (or you could use pipe cleaners).

Hang up and enjoy!

Marbled Hearts

We are big fans of shaving cream art at our house!  You can click here and here to see some of our other activities with shaving cream.

If you haven't tried it yet, you have to!!  It's so fun, so easy and oh so pretty once it's dry.

To celebrate everything "love" this year, Sweet Girl and I made shaving cream heart art.

All you need is shaving cream, a pan or cookie sheet, cardstock and your choice of food coloring.

Start by spraying your shaving cream all over your cookie sheet or pan.  Then add several drops of your food coloring.

Have your little one mix it up and make swirls.  We used the end of a grill brush, but you can use anything...even fingers and hands!

Press your paper (or heart in this case) into the shaving cream.  Then just pull it up slowly...let it sit for about 5 minutes or so and then scrap off all the extra shaving cream.  (I used a plastic knife to scrap).

Once it's dry, you have some beautiful artwork!! 

Happy Valentine's Day

(template from Swoone)

Valentine Heart Bird Feeders

Sweet Girl gets a subscription to High Five magazine from her Mimi (we love you Mimi!) and these heart bird feeders were featured as the activity this month.  They were fun and easy to make!

Start by cutting out a heart from a piece of cardboard.  Make a hole for your ribbon towards the top of the heart.

Then spread shortening over your cardboard hearts.  You can also use peanut butter if you don't have shortening.

Then press birdseed all over your heart. (Quick clean up tip: cover your cookie sheet with saran warp.)

Shake off the excess birdseed.

Tie on your ribbon and hang in your tree!

Valentine's Tot Trays

Sweet Girl and I finally pulled out all our Valentine's Day stuff.  She had lots of fun looking through all our things and I really enjoyed having her help me make our trays.  These are the trays she requested.

Uppercase and lowercase heart matching

This is from a Time for Tots set from last year.

Attaching heart close pins to a heart bowl

Heart color matching

Heart counting and placing the appropriate number inside each heart container

Letter writing and a mailbox

For this activity, I just wrote out some words for her to trace and then place in the mailbox.

Making Hearts - Toddler Crafts

I'm always trying to think of activities that both my son and daughter can do during our craft/art time.  Making these hearts was a fun little activity for both my almost three year old and my one year old.

Using the Do-A-Dot markers we made Valentine's Day cards and some heart pictures.

Here you can see where I cut out a heart shape and gently taped it down onto the cardstock so we would have a nice clean heart on the paper once the shape was removed.

This is my one year old getting into the action.  He really enjoyed playing around with the dot markers.  And they are chubby enough for his little hands!

These are the finished pictures and cards....

Happy heart making!!

Valentine's Tot Trays and More!!

I thought I would share our Valentine's Day tot trays and sensory bin from last year!  I'm in the process of putting some new and updated trays together for Sweet Girl, but will likely use some of these as well.  Just click on the link underneath each picture to be taken to the original post and more ideas!!

Valentine's Tot Trays Part I

Valentine's Tot Trays Part II

Valentine's Sensory Bin

DIY Love Wall Art

I saw this during one of my many Pinterest puruses and really want to try to make my own.  I couldn't find all the letters I needed for my little saying at our craft store ( I wanted lowercase letters) so I used some of my alphabet stickers I had on hand instead.  They worked out fabulously!

I adhered my stickers onto the 12x12 canvas with some Mod Podge and then painted over the whole things with some white craft paint.  I'm loving how it looks in our kitchen!

Our Favorite Valentine's Day Books

For Valentine's each year, I try to add new books to our bookshelf.  These are our current favorites, but I'm still on the lookout for some new ones this year.

Kisses, by Barney Saltzberg

Love Splat, by Rob Scotton

Love and Kisses, by Sarah Wilson

These last two are actually "Valentine's Day" related books, but they are so sweet and all about love so I threw them in the mix!!

Kiss Kiss, by Margaret Wild and Bridget Strevens-Marzo

Someday, by Alison McGhee

(Just try to read this one without crying...I dare ya!)

What about you???  What are your favorite Valentine's Day books??



Valentine's Day Crafts



Bring on the pink and red!!  Valentine's Day is just around the corner!  Can you believe it??  I have lots of fun crafts and activities planned for us this year, but here are some of our favorites from last year.

Valentine's playdough cupcakes

Supplies needed: "chocolate" and "vanilla" playdough, cupcake wrappers, heart cookie cutter and glitter (or sprinkles)

Heart suncatcher

Supplies needed: red, pink, white tissue paper, contact paper and a piece of cardstock to cut your heart shape out of

Marshmallow heart

Supplies needed: mini marshmallows (enough for the heart and for snacking!!), glue and construction paper

Heart sponge painting

Supplies needed: red and pink paint, heart shape cut from sponges (I use the dollar store sponges because they come three to a pack!)

Heart thumbprint magnets

Supplies needed: salt dough, red and pink paint and some cute little thumbs