DIY VALENTINE'S

Ah, Valentine’s Day. If you have an elementary or preschooler in the house, then you know that the aisles of every store are just bursting with pre-made cards that contain lollipops, pencils, or stickers for the kids to hand out to everyone in their class. Now, to be clear, I have sent those cards out, because they are easy and life gets busy. I’ve also done the cute, traditional ones where we glue stick doilies to construction paper for days! However, sometimes it’s fun to do something a little different.

So, I thought I’d share my very favorite Valentines that we have ever done in my house. These are super cute, easy, reusable AND made from recycled materials! Awesome, right? You need three things: old crayons, a mold (a silicone muffin mold or ice cube tray is ideal), and something to package your crayons so your little one can hand them out to friends.

We have an arts and crafts bin that always has some spare, unloved, broken crayons at the bottom. The crayons that we get free at restaurants or the ones that just break in half, never to be used again. If you have a similar bin, pull out all those unloved pieces and start unwrapping! Preheat your oven to 175 degrees. Take your molds (we actually used molds from an old bath bomb kit for the ones pictured) and start filling them with the crayon pieces that you have removed the paper from, mix those colors up and have fun, the colors will swirl as the crayons melt.

Once the molds are almost full, place the molds on a cookie sheet and bake for 10-15 minutes until melted. Let them cool for about 30 minutes, and then pop them out. Repeat as needed until you have enough crayons and voila – the cutest little Valentines! Just for fun, we made a template for the cutest free printable labels you can print out and stick to your bag of Valentines crayons.

Download Valentine Template Here.

Triple win – cute Valentines for the class, you just saved some money and you cleaned out your crayon bin!