by Michele Wilmonen

Created on: February 06, 2010

Kids love Valentine’s Day.  They are not scarred by loves lost and broken hearts, for them Valentine’s Day is still innocent.  It is the first big holiday since the Winter Break and a chance for another school party.  If you are tired of having the kids do the same old construction paper crafts for the party and are short of ideas what are you going to do to keep them entertained?

-Pin the Nose (games)-

A version of the old “Pin the tail on the Donkey” game, but altered for Valentine’s Day by using hearts.  The purpose of the game is to have the kids place a nose on the face of a heart just like they would pin the tail on the picture of a donkey.

To create the game, first make a large heart by using a sheet a red poster board.  Next, add eyes and a mouth to the heart so that it resembles a face.  You can do this a number of ways; by drawing them on, using stickers or you can use other craft materials such as pom poms.  Complete the face as much as you want, but do not add a nose instead draw a circle where the nose would normally go.

For the nose game pieces use something that will stick to the poster board and can identify the child that put it on there.  An easy material to use is craft shapes, they are foam shapes that have a sticky backing on them.  They are good to use because you can use a felt tip pen and write the child’s name on them also.

Now that you have created the game you are ready to play and the rules are simple. 

Blindfold each child when it is their turn and let them try to pin the nose in the correct place on the heart.  The child who is the closest to the center of the circle that you drew on the heart in place of the nose wins the game.

Tip: If you have a large group of kids that you will be doing this for you may want to make two hearts and have two lines going at the same time.

-Scrapbook Page Valentines (crafts)-

Visit your local scrapbooking store or large retailer and purchase scrapbook pages.  These are the large 12 x 12 pages that people glue their photos and other accents to.  They come in a huge variety of designs and prints to choose from that will work for boys or girls.

To start, fold the page with the white side in and the print on the outside.  The pages can be left folded in half to resemble a regular card or they can be cut to resemble a heart when opened.  With the print already on the paper very little decorating will need to be done to the outside and the child can concentrate on decorating and writing on just the inside, this is an advantage for two reasons. 

One, it is a time saver if you are not wanting to spend the whole activity time on this project.  Not only are you cutting down time on the activity as a whole you are focusing the children that would have spent the whole time working on the outside only to run out of time for the inside.  This way all of the kids are decorating the same thing and if they run out time they will still have a decorated outside and inside.

Two, it saves on material costs.  With the outside already decorated this means that you will only have to purchase materials for the inside of the card.  The card comes half decorated meaning that you only have to purchase half the materials for the rest.

Tip: To save money on the scrapbook pages find the pages that are on clearance or purchase them on a bulk package.  Don’t worry if they aren’t Valentine’s Day designs the kids will add their own Valentine’s Day touches to them.

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