Valentines Crafts with HEART, not Sugar!
Valentine’s Day is a holiday for crafting…. we craft the kids’ boxes for school Valentine’s parties, cards to hand out to friends, and sometimes even some special play kits or games to donate to their classrooms at school.
Avoiding sugar and chocolate at this time of year can be TOUGH! These Valentine’s cards and play kit are full of fun, just not the sugar. There are so many tutorials online about how to create the melted crayon hearts I used on the Valentine’s cards, so I won’t spend time explaining that here… but I WILL provide a free printable of the “You Color my World” graphic. I enlisted the help of my mom to cut out all of the little flower circles in pretty pink papers because she owns a Cricut paper cutting machine . She sent a cute little Valentine for my daughter along with the flower circles.
Once I cut out all of my graphic circles, assembly was a cinch. I used a tape runner like you’d use for scrapbooking to adhere the graphic to the flower circle, but a glue stick would work just fine. TIP: Have your child write their name on the back of the flower BEFORE you glue to crayon heart to the front! I found the big glue dots from the scrapbooking section of the craft store worked best to adhere the crayon to the paper.
Download the “You Color my World” Graphic HERE!
My daughter’s Pre-K and Kindergarten classrooms both have a little play kitchen area for the kids to play for indoor recess or other free/play time. I made a little felt cookie play set to donate to the classroom for Valentine’s Day and it was so well-received. When my next daughter had the same teacher 3 years later, the set was still in use! Boys and girls alike love to roll out the dough and use the cookie cutters to ‘cut out’ heart shaped cookies, decorate with different colored frostings, and then ‘bake’ on a baking sheet. It all stores neatly in a drawstring bag.
You can use any shape cookie cutter for this craft, I chose hearts because it was a Valentine’s themed kit. The first step is to find a cookie cutter, this will be your pattern and will become part of the play kit. In addition to the cookie cutter, you will need a little wooden rolling pin for play, and a tray (or 2) to use as a baking sheet… I think I found these at a dollar store.
Fabric and Notions:
- Tan felt
- Colored felt for ‘frosting’
- Tan thread or embroidery floss
- Colored embroidery floss for ‘sprinkles’
- Iron on interfacing/fusible fleece
- Woven fabric for a carrying bag (about a half yard)
- Piece of ribbon or thin rope for a draw string
The cookies and ‘dough’ are two layers of felt to make them more sturdy. Exact size will depend on the size of your cookie cutter. You will want to leave a minimum of 3/4-inch spacing between your cookies, use the cookie cutter to estimate placement – you should be able to push the cutter down onto the fabric and see the impression it leaves. Once you’ve estimated the size of the dough, cut the corners round and sew the outside edges of the two layers of dough together. I avoid hand sewing whenever possible, so I used my serger to zip around the edges of the ‘dough.’
After the 2 layers of ‘dough’ are sewn together, make the final markings of the cookies – push the cookie cutter into the felt and then trace the impression so the cookie is neither larger or smaller than the cutter (as would happen if you traced the cutter itself). Carefully cut out the cookies and use embroidery thread (about half a strand) and a blanket stitch to hand sew the cookies together and the cookie shaped holes in the dough.
To make the frosting, trace one of your heart cookies onto a piece of paper. Cut about 1/4-inch off all the way around and lay it over your cookie to see if you like the fit. Once you are happy with your pattern, trace it onto a single layer of colored felt until you have the same amount of frosting shapes as cookies. Cut them out. Use a full strand of embroidery floss in multiple colors to sew ‘sprinkles’ onto the frostings. Try to be strategic so that the embroidery floss is not zig zagging all over the back of the frosting. Cut a piece of fusible fleece or iron on interfacing just smaller than the frosting, iron onto the back of each piece of frosting.
Go shopping at a dollar store or craft store for little wooden rolling pins and a tray that will fit your cookies without being too over sized. *Don’t be afraid to take your dough with you when you go shopping to check the sizing, people will be totally impressed by your clever crafting skills!
Come home and stack up all of your goodies in a neat stack. Measure the length and width of the stack. Fold a piece of woven material in half to measure a bag about 2 inches wider than the stack and 5-6 inches longer. Open up the folded fabric and fold over the edge that will be the opening to create a 1.5-inch hem, press the fold. Fold the raw edge of the hem in slightly (or serge the raw edge) and sew down. Sew a second line of stitching 1/4-inch closer to the folded hem (or just larger than the width of your drawstring) to create a casing. Thread drawstring through casing. Fold right sides together and sew along bottom/short edge and side/long edge – stop sewing when you get to the casing and start again on the other side of the casing. Turn the bag right sides out and push the ends of the draw string out to the right sides of the bag.
Press the unfrosted cookies into the cookie-shaped holes in the dough. Kids can use the rolling pin to roll the dough, then the cookie cutters to cut out the cookie shapes. Add frosting and place on the tray to ‘bake’!
