Love Blossom Tree

I am in love with this craft!
It's really easy and such a great keepsake.  I found the idea at a great blog called Meet the Dubiens. 

I painted Matthew's arm with brown paint and pressed it onto some pink cardstock.  Next I tried to help Matthew make thumbprint hearts but he was not interested......so these are my lovely thumbprint hearts! 

I started with red leaves and thought it looked a little bare........

.....so I added pink and white hearts and then thought I went a bit overboard.

Still very pretty!

I find thumbprint hearts are actually a little tricky for my kids but I think this craft would look just as pretty with red, pink and white single thumbprints for leaves instead.  I love this craft so much I have a little idea that I am planning to do with it in a future post - stay tuned!

Happy Valentine's Day!

Valentine Food Day

Valentine Breakfast, Lunch and Snack!

These heart pancakes were very cute but really messy to make.  I put them in a cake decorating bag and squeezed out the batter.  While I was making them Chris said, "Why don't you just make regular pancakes and cut them into hearts with your heart cookie cutter?"   Ummmmm, I don't know why I didn't think of that before I had the pancake batter spilling all over the counter.  I will remember that for next time!

 This cute heart-dog I saw in the Valentine Family Fun magazine.  They turned out great and the kids thought they were awesome.  It's simply a hot dog, cheese cut into arrow shapes and a pasta noodle.

We had lots of of white chocolate chips left over from all the peppermint bark we made over Christmas so we made some Valentine Pretzel Sticks for snack.  I melted the chocolate in a double boiler and used a spoon to pour the melted chocolate on the pretzels.  Then the kids sprinkled them with Valentine sprinkles and we popped them in the fridge to cool.  Be sure to place them on parchment paper or they will stick to your plate. 

Snack time was very quiet as the kids enjoyed their treat. 

YUMMY!

Birdseed Valentine Ornament

We have previously made gelatin based bird seed ornaments.  It was a super easy recipe - add 2 packages of Knox gelatin to 1 cup of water, simmer on low in a medium sized pot until the gelatin is dissolved, add 2 cups of birdseed, stir and pour into mold.  Set in fridge for at least 2 hours.

They turned out great!  However, because the gelatin base is so soft the birds {and squirrels} devoured the ornaments within minutes right before our eyes.  While entertaining for the kids, I wanted an ornament that would last a little longer!

So, here is a new recipe that we tried with great results!

Birdseed Ornaments

3/4 cup flour

1/2 cup water

3 tablespoons corn syrup

4 cups bird seed

Mix well and set in molds

Dry for 4-6 hours, take out of molds and turn over, dry for another 4-6 hours.

This is a much drier mixture which made it very easy to work with.  I used an old spring form pan with an upside down glass in the center to shape the wreath.

And here is the finished product!

Love it!

We also filled a Valentine mini cake pan.

{we poked holes for the ribbon with a darning needle while it was still wet}

And here is our sweet little Valentine present for the birdies!

This new recipe will be the one we use from now on!

Happy Valentine's Day to our little tweet friends!

Valentine Mailbox

Sometimes I am surprised by how much my kids will like certain crafts.  For example, the paper roll owl family {found here} I thought was cute but didn't think the kids would play with them for very long.  It turned out the owl family was a big hit and continues to get play time!

Then I saw these mailboxes.  Again, I thought it was a cute craft but did not expect how much the kids would love them!  They were so excited to decorate their mailboxes and started writing out and mailing Valentine's to each other as soon as the paint dried.

Here is how you make them......

Look through your cupboards and get some heavy weight cereal or cracker boxes.

First you will make the bottom of you mailbox {this will make more sense as you keep reading}.
Trace out the bottom of your box onto another piece of cardboard.
Add rectangles for 'tabs'.
Cut out, fold up the tabs and set this piece aside.

Then, carefully take the boxes apart at the seams and cut off the bottom flaps so that when put back together the bottom will be open.

Turn them 'inside out' and reglue them together.  This way you can paint them. {I used a glue gun which quickly and strongly held them together with no wait time}

Cut out your mailbox slot.

You could leave the box as is or you can cut out some mailbox legs as seen in the picture below.  The pic below also shows how the bottom of the mailbox will look once inserted.

Then paint and decorate your mailbox. 

Poke some small holes into the mailbox door and add a pipecleaner handle.

All done!

Have fun mailing all those Valentine's!

Homemade Bath Salts

This is a quick and fun little activity to do!

1 cup Epsom salts

1-2 drops of food coloring diluted with a few drops of water

a few drops of an essential oil

We only had tea tree oil so the smell was a bit medicinal, but the kids didn't care.  They enjoyed mixing the color and oil into the salts and especially enjoyed dumping it into their bath!

You could use lavender oil and package up some 'Lavender Bath Salts' as Valentine gifts {great idea C!}.  Peppermint or eucalyptus oil would be other good oils to try.

So simple!

Felt Valentine Fortune Cookies

I made these cute Felt Valentine Fortune Cookies for the kids to open and read their fortune on Valentine's Day.

 Trace out a circle (about a 3"-4" diameter) on some felt.

I used a drinking glass for the circle shape.

Use a glue gun to draw a line of glue down the middle. 

Put a piece of florist wire on the glue .......

.......cover with a ribbon and press down into the glue.  Let dry.

Then fold your circle in half, ribbon to the inside, and bend and shape into a fortune cookie!

Here is our felt fortune cookie bowl!

The kids are excited to read their Valentine Fortunes!

'Found object' Valentine Painting

Here is an activity we did during our last snow day......hence the pj's!

I had Sarah and Matthew collect some household objects that they would like to paint with.  I guided them a little bit since one of Matthew's objects was a paintbrush and that would kind of negate the 'found object' idea. 

I found this fun painting idea here. 

This craft was a hit!  It engaged them for a long time....

and turned out pretty cool too!

Candy Heart Gingerbread Man

We smashed a lot of Jolly Ranchers to make the secret message decoder cookies.  I needed to come up with another idea to use up some of the crushed candy and found these. 

Make your favorite gingerbread recipe, cut out bears or gingerbread man shapes and place on a sprayed foil lined cookie sheet.

Cut out a heart shape and fill with your crushed candy.

Bake at 350 degrees for approx. 10 min and cool completely.

Dip in melted chocolate and set in the fridge to cool.

Cute and Yummy! 

I need to remember this when making our gingerbread house next Christmas.  The candy would make great looking glass window panes!

Thought I would add this picture.......a little sign of spring amongst all the snow!

Valentine Cinnamon Salt Dough Ornaments

I love the smell of this cinnamon salt dough baking and the kids love molding it, rolling it and cutting out shapes.
We made this at Christmas and it was a big hit so I thought we could make it for Valentine's Day too.  You can find the ingredients and directions here.

We cut out a bunch of different sized hearts and used a chopstick to put holes in them for stringing.

We strung them on thin red ribbon and decorated the house.

Here is a picture of our Valentine mantle.

Will you be my Sticky Valentine?

We painted with...........corn syrup!?!

The kids thought this was hilarious!

I cut out a heart from cardstock and poured some corn syrup in the middle.  Then I spread it out on the heart for Matthew.  Jillian spread her own corn syrup which did become a bit sticky.  Be careful that you don't use too much corn syrup because it will take forever to dry.  You need enough to swirl around but not too much.

The kids dropped food coloring on the corn syrup.  Do not use too much blue or green coloring as it will make your design far too dark.  I would recommend only 1-2 drops of the darker colors.

Then swirl the coloring around and around.  We used the back of a chubby paintbrush to do the swirling.

Matthew only used red and yellow coloring and it turned out so pretty.

It takes a long time to dry.  I'd recommend setting it out of the way for 2 to 3 days so that it won't be disturbed while it is drying.

The end result has such a pretty shine.

You could also pour corn syrup into an ice cube tray, mix the colors in and paint the syrup on with a paint brush.  This would result in a thinner layer of corn syrup and a shorter drying time.  We will probably try it like this the next time we craft with corn syrup!

Secret Message Decoder Valentine Cookies

I thought these 'decoder cookies' looked so cool!  I was excited to try them out!

We started with Matthew sorting Jolly Rancher candies into their color groups.
{you could also use lifesavers} 

And smashing the candy into small pieces - his favorite part.

We used the red candies for the decoder cookies and are saving the other colors for another Valentine treat you will see in an upcoming post.

• Use your favorite sugar cookie recipe {I'm not posting the one I used because I found they came out on the hard side.  I've yet to find a favorite go-to sugar cookie recipe so if you have one let me know!}
• Prepare your baking sheet by covering with foil and lightly coat with cooking spray {be sure to spray or your cookies will stick!}
• Roll your dough to 1/4" thick and cut out with large heart cutter and place on baking sheet.
• Cut out the center with a slightly smaller heart cutter and remove the dough.
• Fill the center with your crushed candy.
• Bake for 10 minutes or until lightly golden on the edges.
• Cool completely and store in airtight container.



Now for the FUN part!

Write out a secret message in thin light blue pen and then scribble and doodle all over it with pink, red or purple pen.

Use your decoder cookie window to read the secret message!

SO COOL!!!

This was a fun after dinner activity.  Each of us picked one family member and wrote out a secret Valentine message to that person.  Then we all exchanged the messages and read them to each other with the decoder cookie.  It was a great way to have the kids say something nice about one another and it provided a yummy dessert!