{ snow day }

{ V-Day fun }

The boys & I had a great week filled with lots & lots of hearts, friends, yummy treats, hundreds of "I Love You"s and loads of Valentine's Day fun. Here is a sampling of our {heart} day activities...

CJ is quite the multi-tasker
Easy (and way less messy) way to stamp with sponges. Cut your design out of a sponge and attach a wine cork to the sponge with hot glue. I bought a big bag of various sized sponges at Dollar General for $1 and we use them for lots of crafts & fun activities.
Easy painting activity incorporating the alphabet and Valentine's Day
Thumbprint clay magnets made for the grandparents
Yummy sweet treats made for all of our friends. Click here for the recipe.

VALENTINE'S DAY TREATS

A couple of weeks ago I found these cute heart-shaped silicone molds in the $1 bin at Target and thought they would be perfect to make heart-shaped crayons for T & Baby CJ to give out for Valentine's Day to all of their friends.  This project is super easy and great to do with the little ones.  T loved having an excuse to break his crayons and enjoyed putting all of the pieces into the individual molds.  

Directions:  

1. Gather crayons & remove wrapping.  (Note:  Because I didn't want to use our "washable" crayons, I posted an ad on Craig's List looking for unwanted crayons.  I received an overwhelming response (who knew?) and ended up getting a huge tub of crayons from a generous lady right down the street for FREE.)
2. Preheat oven to 250 degrees.
3. Break crayons into tiny pieces and drop into mold.  (Note:  Be sure not to overfill the mold, as crayon will melt and overflow)  
4. Put the mold into the oven for about 15-20 minutes or until the crayons are completely melted.  (Note:  Place the molds on a separate baking tray to make it easier to remove from oven and to prevent any spills.)
5. After you remove them from the oven, let them sit for 15 minutes and then place them in the freezer for an additional 10 minutes.
6. Pop them out of the tray and voila...oh, so cute & crafty crayon hearts.  

I also got some cute Valentine's Day treat bags in the $1 bin at Target that I am going to place the hearts in.  Total cost of project= $3.50  ($2.50 for molds, $1 for bags)...very thrifty!