Handmade love is a beautiful, almost redundant phrase. It's also what we decided to do with Tucker's kindergarten class valentines this year. In the past we have tried to purchase earth-friendly cards. That was a somewhat expensive and impersonal (even if really cute) way to go.
This year I was determined to do something handmade for a few reasons. 1. Budget. 2.Handmade is the general direction in which we are trying to aim our family activities. 3. This allowed Tucker to practice his cutting, handwriting, and thoughtfulness skill as he created them.
My idea came from Family Fun. I selected 4 of the ideas offered. We used recycled colored cardstock
purchased at a local office supply store, a red pen, scissors, and some carefully selected candies.
purchased at a local office supply store, a red pen, scissors, and some carefully selected candies. 
They came out really cute. Tucker is proud of his creations and excited to share them with his friends. I think this is the best valentine option we have explored yet, but still far from perfect. Neither the cardstock ($8, with leftovers for other crafts) nor candy (which had to be bought in large bags to get the right kind, the rest of which was donated to the classroom) were cheap. I am not a big fan of giving kids even more packaged candy. Unfortunately, I haven't come up with a brilliant better option around the school's rules yet. Perhaps next year we will be more clever in our messaging and give pencils or erasers or some more useful thing.
But for this year, these are splendidly fun, cute, tasty, and certainly handmade with love. What are you doing for kid's valentines this year?
Next time I will share our Valentine's Day teacher gift creations.
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Keep your eye on facebook, because I am planning to post pictures of Avery's valentines this year. We took all of our old, naked, and broken crayons and turned them into new crayons.
I received some silicone baking molds awhile ago and bought a couple at Christmas time in the $1 section at Target.
She made hearts and bugs, and we are going to cut out little crayon cards that will say things like "Hey Buggy...you color my life!" Or, "You fill my heart with color!".
It was a way to use all of those unused crayons, and in the end will only cost me about $1 for the little baggies from the Dollar Store.
The molds are a pain to store, and not the most eco-friendly, but we've shared them throughout the neighborhood and used them to make a lot of gifts.
If you ever want to borrow them too, let me know!
That is brilliant Michele! I can't wait to see it!
This year I cut out strips of tag board and the kids made bookmark Valentine cards for the other studnets in their class. Nothing really fancy - they just put stickers on the rectangles and signed their names. I suppose you could also punch a hole at the top and thread some ribbon through to make it more bookmark-ish!
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