I am involved with a Mommy & Me meetup group that meets once a week and does little activities for the kiddos and gives the moms a chance to chat and exchange ideas. Recently, I volunteered to be an Activities Coordinator (fancy title, I know). I help the organizer come up with different games, crafts, and activities for the pre-school aged kids to do to keep them entertained.
We are having our Valentine's party tomorrow, so I spent a couple hours today getting two crafts ready. I'm sick of cutting out hearts! I found both of these ideas on Pinterest, but just looked at the picture for inspiration and didn't actually follow any tutorial.
Valentine's Head Piece
The first craft the kiddos will do is make their Valentine's Day headpiece. As you can see it's very simple, made of paper and pipe cleaners, but I think the kids will enjoy making them and running around wearing them.
Materials:
2 strips of white card stock about 1 inch x 11 1/2 inch (the length of the paper)
2 short pipe cleaners
2 paper hearts (I made some out of construction paper and some out of scrapbook paper scraps I had)
scotch tape
crayons or other coloring tools
First, we will tell the kiddos to create a masterpiece with crayons on the white strips of card stock. This will eventually be the head band, so it might be cute to put their name somewhere on it. After the artwork is complete tape together the two pieces of card stock into a circle that fits the kiddos head.
Next tape the hearts to one end of each pipe cleaner. Tape the other end of the pipe cleaner to the inside of the head band, making sure to evenly space them around whatever side is the "front". Easy!
"Stained Glass" Heart
Craft #2 is very easy as well. After I had all of the pieces cut out and to the point where a kiddo would actually be participating, this craft was quick and easy. Cutting out the hearts, measuring and cutting the contact paper to size, and cutting all the tissue paper felt like it took forever, but then I did have to do enough for 15 or so kids.
Materials you will need:
2 paper hearts (I used card stock. You could use any type of paper though)
Small squares of tissue paper in whatever colors you want to use (I used light pink, dark pink, and red)
2 pieces of contact paper just big enough to cover your paper hearts
scissors
a hole punch
a piece of ribbon or string
First peel off the backing of one of the pieces of contact paper and face sticky side up. Place one of the paper hearts on the contact paper. Make sure that all the edges of the heart are on the contact paper and not hanging off.
Begin randomly placing tissue paper squares inside the perimeter of the heart. I started on one side and worked my way across, but I know the kids will be sticking them where ever and it will look just as good in a random pattern. Try to cover all the contact paper with tissue paper, but if you don't it won't hurt anything.
After you are happy with the tissue paper coverage, take your second heart cut out and place it on top of the first heart with the tissue paper in between. Now peel the backing off of your remaining piece of contact paper and place it sticky side down on top of your heart and smooth out any bubbles.
Cut off the contact paper that is sticking out around the heart. Use a hole punch to create a hole at the top of your heart and thread a piece of ribbon or string so that you can hang your new "stained glass" heart in a window or you can leave it without a hole and ribbon and just tape it to a window.
You could also use this same process with other shapes for any holiday. I'm thinking a shamrock for St Patty's Day, an Easter egg, a Star for the 4th of July, or just a square or circle for any time of year.
Update 2/15: We did our crafts with the kids today and they went over pretty well! The kids really enjoyed the stained glass project. They weren't really into the head piece, but they enjoyed coloring the head band. I don't think any of them wore them at all, but we did have some prissy little girls who don't like messing up their hair!
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