Valentine's Day 2013

I was just about to make a quick, lunch-break trip to Hobby Lobby a couple weeks before Valentine's Day to see if I could find one of those paper mache mailboxes for Will to decorate for his class party... when Craig insisted that he was going to make one at home instead.  Will is still completely enamored with Transformers and Craig wanted to make him an Optimus Prime letter box. 

Seriously, the amount of effort and detail I watched Craig put into this thing was ridiculous...ly adorable.  :)  Craig said he always had a cool homemade box when he was a kid and he wanted the same for Will.

Will's job was to color in the cab and hood, which were covered in paper with flame outlines sketched in.

Will LOVED this!

You can see the open flap at the back of the truck bed.  That's where the Valentine's went in and, when lifted up, it had Will's name displayed on the underside.  Then the flap was able to tuck inside at the end of the party.

Will also spent some time the weekend before V-Day filling out some requested, store-bought, Transformer Valentine's to pass out to his friends.  Of course.

 

Thankfully, Sophie's preschool class made all their own Valenine's "pouches" in class so she didn't need a box.  But we did make her Valentine's at home from an idea on Pinterest.  I printed a fish bowl template just large enough to fit into a resealable sandwich bag and then traced one for each child in her class onto cardstock.  I cut them out and wrote in the wording on one of my lunch breaks at work and then Craig spent an evening that I was taking Will to karate to work with Sophie on tracing her name on each of them.  She's still not completely legible with writing her name yet, but it's getting better.

On another evening, she and Will worked together to put the fish bowls into the bags and spoon a few spoonfuls of fish crackers in each.

They read:

"Valenine, I'm glad we're in the same school!  Love, Sophie"

Valentine's Day 2013 - and party day for both kids at school today!

No great shots of both of them together this morning, but oh well.

This evening, Nana came by to bring them each a Valentine surprise (an OSU t-shirt for Will and a Comets t-shirt for Soph + some treats for each) and then she let them climb in her lap and sort through all their cards from their school friends.  They were in heaven.  And I was grateful for some free moments to finish up dinner preparations.  Thank you, Nana!

Happy Valentine's Day!

Valentine's Day Books

The kids' Valentine's Day "treats" from mom and dad were... SURPRISE!... a couple of books. We didn't wrap them up. We just read them at the dinner table while the kids were having dessert and told them these were for keeps. :)

I love these "God Gave Us..." books. We bought God Gave Us You when Will was just 7-ish weeks old while on vacation in Grand Haven and I noted on the inside cover that it was a gift for his baptism in September. So sweet. I love that story.

Anyway, God Gave Us Love seemed like an appropriate title for Valentine's Day so this was one of the books.

The second was a Ladybug Girl book about what she "loves". This is our first Ladybug Girl book and I think they seem so cute. Both books are really for both kids, but Sophie has been keeping this one in her room and Will doesn't mind.
And here are some others that we borrowed from the library as well:

One last thing, only because I didn't know where else to put this...

Here's a cute little "puzzle" Will brought home for me from the babysitter's around Valentine's Day. I've actually seen this type of "puzzle" before and thought it was such a cute/clever idea but haven't gotten around to trying it.

Will gave me an envelope... don't ask me what it says. :) I think it's supposed to be "To: Mommy" and "Love: Will". :)

...and Daddy.

Then inside were a bunch of craft sticks that were numbered at the bottom and a message/picture across them. You have to line up the numbers to read the message. (I think the #8 stick is upside down though.) When I saw this idea, the sticks weren't numbered... but that definitely helps! Isn't it cute?

And that's a wrap on my Valentine's posts!

Happy Valentine's Day!

Valentine Craftin' With Sophie

On Monday night before Valentine's Day, Will and Craig went off to karate while Sophie and I stayed home and did a few, fun, crafty activities. I saw this super easy idea on Pinterest (linked from this blog): heart stamping with a toilet paper tube. Flatten the tube lengthwise and then bend one crease inward to create a heart shape. Wrap a piece of tape (any kind) around the tube to hold the shape and let child "stamp" paint onto paper with it. I gave her a large pink heart to stamp on and some red and white paint.

Fun!

Next, I gave her a strip of paper with the letters of her name written inside of traced hearts. I also gave her some foam, heart stickers wrapped inside of a paper pouch like a present. Each of the stickers had a letter of her name on them and she had to match up the letters and stick them down. We've always taught her to spell her name in a sort of sing-song voice so it's easier to remember and she's got it down now.

Peeling paper backing... good fine motor work.

Spelling her name to me... She loved this and carried it all around. Now it hangs on her bedroom door like a sign.

And finally, I've been meaning to try making melted crayon molds for literally YEARS. Don't know why I never got around to it, but finally we did. There are about a bazillion recipes out there to follow, but they're all basically the same. Peel the crayons (I found the paper of off-brand crayons - NOT CRAYOLA - comes off much easier), chop into pieces, place in a mold and bake.

Sophie helped me peel paper briefly. Then I chopped and gave her the tray back like this. Tons of people were claiming to find silicone heart trays in the Target dollar bins, but I never did. So I ordered mine from Amazon for like $7.99 and it's good for freezer or oven. Probably a rip-off, but serves me right for being last minute. The size of hearts was smaller than I anticipated but in the end, it was perfect for our project.

Dividing up the pieces. I wasn't sure how many crayons to use and it didn't initially seem like that much, but I ended up making three trays worth of hearts - 30 total. I'm saving them for next Valentine's Day. :)

Into the 200 degree oven, on a foil-lined cookie sheet, for 10 minutes.

When they come out, the tops look totally blended and not what you expect. But once they cool and you pop them out of the tray, the bottom sides look really neat.

I found a template for a Valentine with the Earth background and a message so I just printed them on regular paper and glued them to a bigger card stock circle. Then I used "Zots" (glue dots" - lots of them - to stick the crayon to the center of the paper.

Sophie only gives Valentine's to her friends at the sitter's so we only needed to make five cards.

On Valentine's Day, I sent a tray of cookies along with both kids Valentine's cards to the babysitter's house.