{Ten Children's Books We Love, About Love}

Our top ten kids' books for settling down for a snuggle together!

(And perfect for Valentine's Day):

Plant a Kiss by Amy Krouse Rosenthal

[All links are affiliate links]

Watch what happens when you plant the seed of love - see it grow and sparkle! (with actual sparkles!)

The Giant Hug by Sandra Horning

Owen wants to send his granny a giant hug through the mail, and the hug brings happiness to everyone along its journey.

Guess How Much I Love You by Sam McBratney

A classic! Little Nutbrown Hare wants to show Big Nutbrown Hare just how much love he has - but he's got some competition!

I Love It When You Smile by Sam McBratney

Mama loves me even when I'm feeling on the grumpy side! 

What can mama do to make little kangaroo smile?

The Kissing Hand by Audrey Penn

Little Chester doesn't want to leave his mama to go school, so mama finds a way for Chester to take her love with him everywhere he goes. Perfect for kids experiencing separation anxiety, preparing to start preschool, or for mama returning to work.

 

Somebody Loves You, Mr Hatch by Eileen Spinelli

See the difference it makes when somebody loves you! 

Mr Hatch transforms from a grouch to a thoughtful friend with a little love.

Mama Loves You by Caroline Stutson

Sweet rhyming prose. Every mama loves her baby. One of our absolute favourite books of all!

I Love You, Stinky Face by Lisa McCourt

Your mama loves you, no matter what!

I Love You, Too by Eve Bunting

All the little animals bring special gifts for their mamas 

to show how much they love them - and their mamas shower them with love, too!

Those last 3 can also be bought together in a compendium, 

along with other sweet mama-love stories, called I Love You: A Keepsake Storybook Collection, which is what we have.

{Pink and Red Heart Party: Personalized Straw Markers}

Another ridiculously easy party decorating craft - and a practical one, too!

How do you keep kids from mixing up their cups at parties? I usually use paper cups and write their names on them. Even if they can't read them, at least the adults can help them find their cups.

But this year, I came up with an even better way to mark their drinks - personalized straw holders!

The inspiration for this idea came from You Make Do, where you can buy all sorts of fun party accessories!

Being the type that likes to make my own accessories, though, all I did was cut heart shapes (to match the pink and red heart party theme, of course) out of stiff, coloured card stock, then used an exacto knife to cut two parallel slits in each one. I wrote their names on (deleted from the pictures) and decorated each one with different stickers (that way it doesn't matter if they can read or not). Then I just slipped the straws through the slits. That's it! It made it really easy for all the guests to keep track of their cups, and also helped to dress up the table, too.

For more pink and red heart party ideas, check Pink and Red Heart Theme Party page and my Heart Party Pinterest board.

{Pink and Red Heart Party: Cupcake Liner Rosettes}

Like Mama Pea Pod for birthday party ideas? Please consider throwing a vote our way in the Red Tricycle Most Awesome awards for Birthday Party Ideas! Thanks so much! x

Another craft from Sweet Pea's pink and red heart-themed birthday party: Rosettes to wear, made from cupcake liners!

Princess Pea has a store-bought 'Birthday Girl' rosette from a couple of years ago, but I thought it might be fun to make these homemade rosettes for all the guests to wear at the party and to take home afterwards.

I followed the tutorial for making cupcake liner rosettes for cards here*, except that I also hot glued a circular piece of coordinating fabric onto the backs and stuck a safety pin through the fabric, so that we could use them as wearable rosettes for the party guests (and my two girls, too, of course).

I had some plain pink, blue and patterned pink cupcake liners that I used, and I happened to have some sparkly craft foam, so there was no need to do the glitter step in the tutorial (though I think they'd still look sweet without the sparkles). 

For the boy at the party, I used a blue craft foam pre-cut star shape (not glittery, but oh well)**.  The only other patterned cupcake liners I had were all Christmas-themed, but it worked out perfectly as our little boy friend is obsessed with snowmen at the moment, so he got a snowman liner in his. 

And I had some sweet cupcake-patterned ribbon in pink and blue that was perfect for the tails.

For more creations from the party, look here. And for other heart-themed party ideas, check out my Heart Party Ideas Pinterest board.



* Although the tutorial looks like there's a lot of steps involved, it was actually a really quick and easy craft to do. 
**Don't get me wrong, it's not that I think pink hearts are unsuitable for boys, but rather that I expected that our 5 year old guest would not be very interested in wearing one. Particularly if his 7 year old brother caught sight of him in it.

{More Pink and Red Heart Party Crafts: Fun toothpick toppers!}

Fun Heart Toothpick Toppers

for Parties

Like Mama Pea Pod for birthday party ideas? Please consider throwing a vote our way in the Red Tricycle Most Awesome awards for Birthday Party Ideas! Thanks so much! x

Nothing says 'party' like decorative toothpicks, right? ;-)

So I made these for Sweet Pea's pink and red heart birthday party.

I found some craft foam heart shapes in the kids' craft supplies.

I attached one to the top of a toothpick, using one side of a bit of double-sided tape.

Then I peeled off the backing and attached a matching foam heart onto it, 

on the other side of the toothpick.

Cute and easy and took about 2 minutes to make 8 of them!

What other shapes could I make next?

{Swedish Woven Paper Heart Baskets}

Swedish Woven Paper Heart Basket Craft

In Sweden, Santa Lucia, or Saint Lucia's Day, on December 13th is a big part of the Christmas advent tradition. To celebrate Santa Lucia, we made these adorable Swedish Hearts. They are perfect for hanging on the Christmas tree, filled with small treats for guests! 

I originally made these with my 4th and 5th grade students a few years ago around the time of Santa Lucia, when we were talking about Swedish traditions. See more about the Santa Lucia tradition and hear the traditional song in this video. 

I have my colleague to thank for finding this printable template. 

Once we figured it out and got the hang of it, they were so easy and quite addictive! Princess Pea and I then made several more to put little goodies in for friends and colleagues for holiday treats. This latest one will be a Valentine for Princess Pea's little friend who is moving away soon. Haven't yet decided what to fill it with (right now there's just a bunch of foam hearts [affiliate link] in it). Any suggestions?

*Update: We also made them as favour bags for Sweet Pea's pink and red heart-themed birthday party.

So to make them, I'd suggest printing out the template linked above, at least to start out until you get the hang of the necessary proportions. (If you choose to free-hand it instead, it's important to make sure the slits are slightly longer than the width of the whole shape.) Make sure that you fold your paper in half and line up the straight edge along the fold. Then use the template to trace and cut out the shapes from two different papers and cut the slits as shown. (If you're making these for Valentine's Day, it's nice if you have some Valentine-themed paper, or for Christmas, some Christmas-themed paper. [affiliate links])

Next comes the weaving part, which is the part that was tricky at first. I'll try to explain it with our flowery and red papers. Take the far right 'arm' of the flowery paper and insert into the far left arm of the red paper. Then take the middle arm of the red paper and insert into the far right arm of the flowery paper. Then take the far right arm of the flowery paper and insert it into the far right arm of the red paper. Slide it along towards the top of the heart.

At this point you should have the first (far right) arm of the flowery paper woven through all three arms of the red paper. Note that each time, you insert the arm of one into the arm of the other, don't just go front to back or else you won't end up with a 'pocket' that opens in the end. (This is where we went wrong at first.)

Then you take the middle arm of the flowery paper and do the same in reverse: The far left arm of the red paper into the middle arm of the flowery paper; the middle arm of the flowery paper into the middle arm of the red paper; and the far right arm of the red paper into the middle arm of the flowery paper.

And finally, do the reverse with the far left arm of the flowery paper. The last one is a bit tricky, so you have to do it carefully.

This wasn't a craft that Princess Pea (aged 4) was able to make on her own, of course, but she traced and cut out the papers and we did the weaving together until it got too hard and then I finished it off. And she loved getting to use the hole punch and stringing the ribbon through to make a little hanger for it.

This project is featured in a book available at Hands On: As We Grow as part of The Heart Project, a fundraiser to support the American Heart Association. Please consider ordering a copy of this book full of beautiful heart-themed art and craft projects with links to tutorials (available as both a printed book and as an e-book). All proceeds will be donated to the AHA.

{Valentine Ideas Collaborative Project}

Another collaborative project from an amazing group of kids' bloggers, the Valentine Ideas blog hop!

On February 7th, be sure to come by for loads of brilliantly creative Valentine Ideas from:

Mama Pea Pod, Let Kids Create, My Creative Family, Hands on: as we grow, La Dolce Vita: The Sweet Life,  AngeliqueFelix.com, The Golden Gleam, Teach Preschool, Critters and Crayons, Living at the Whitehead Zoo, The Iowa Farmer's Wife, Nurturestore, Kitchen Counter Chronicles, The Chocolate Muffin Tree, Jamie's Jumble, The Outlaw Mom Blog, Mama Smiles, The Mommies Made Me Do It, Dinosaurs and Octopuses, Mom to 2 Posh Lil Divas, Toddler Approved, Messy Kids, Rainy Day Mum, JDaniel4sMom, Glittering Muffins, Red Ted Art, Mommy and Me Book Club, Putti Prapancha, Dilly-Dali Art, Creative Connections for Kids, Mommy Labs, De tout et de rien: Activités pour le Préscolaire, Imagination Soup.net, Rockabye Butterfly, Classified: Mom, Kids Creative Chaos, A Mom with A Lesson Plan, PlayDrMom, RainbowsWithinReach, Living Montessori Now, Curly Birds, Growing A Jeweled Rose, The Home Teacher, A Little Learning For Two, Sun Hats and Wellie Boots, The Imagination Tree, Mummy Mummy Mum, Critters and Crayons, La-La's Home Daycare, Come Together Kids, Tinkerlab, Dirt and Boogers, Multiple Mummy.

{Valentine Tea Light Votive Holders}

Princess Pea and I made these super-easy Valentine-themed tea light holders last weekend, and we just love them! They were quick and easy to make with items already on hand, and they look lovely glowing in our dimly-lit hallway.

We used some empty baby food jars, tissue paper, white glue, and then decorated one with foam hearts and the other with fake rose petals laid in a heart shape.

All we did was tear up little pieces of red and pink tissue paper and glue them onto the jars... 

... then brush a bit of glue over the top (you could also dilute the glue with water, but we didn't), decorate, and leave to dry (we did them in the evening after dinner and left them out overnight). 

The glue dries clear and shiny.

Sweet Pea joined us too, at first, and I gave her a plastic yogurt tub to decorate instead of the glass jar (obviously not for putting a candle into), but she just wanted to paint glue onto the tissue paper and then ran off to do other things. 

If you want, you can tie a bit of ribbon or string around the top (we had a bit of pink yarn on hand), pop in a tea light candle, et voilá! You're ready for a romantic candlelit dinner (or a less romantic dinner with the kids!).

Watch for our upcoming Valentine Ideas blog hop on February 6th!

This project is featured in a book available at Hands On: As We Grow 

as part of The Heart Project, a fundraiser to support the American Heart Association. 

Please consider ordering a copy of this book full of beautiful heart-themed art and craft ideas

(available as both a printed book and as an e-book).

All proceeds will be donated to the AHA.

{Princess Pea's First Valentine - The Follow-Up}

After delivering her Valentines to her friends in the building by taping them to their front doors, Princess Pea discovered these on our door the next morning when leaving for preschool. She was thrilled!