We started the day with preschool, followed by a trip to the bakery (see above), and headed home. We found a wonderful bunch of goodies when we came home (turns out my man came by and brought me some fantasticalness). Bubbly, chocolate, flowers, and cured meats.

FOOOOOlllllowed by my kiddo and I sharing a Valentine’s gift for the Dada of the house (see below). I asked R what she wanted to get him for Valentine’s, she said socks. SOOooooo, she picked out these wonderful dinosaur socks (from Target) and he is wearing them to work today.

We ended the day with food and playing with ponies. Pretty much: a wonderful day. I hope you had the most wonderful Thursday, and a happy Friday to you!

- Chelsey

Well, I know today is ACTUALLY Valentine’s Day… but I really wanted to share these little necklaces that my kiddo and I made (well, mostly me). It all started on a walk. While on our daily walk, we found a tree that had dropped a ton of acorns, so we gathered a the tops and headed to the yarn shop. We bought some colorful wool roving and started felting some pieces to create little faux acorns.

I did this project with my kiddo, and it was SO messy. Water EVERYwhere. It was actually worth all the water splashing since she had so much fun. She worked on one piece the entire time, and called it her “purple cookie”. It was just a flat 2 inch piece of purple wool. She did a great job and uses it as a blanket for her ponies. I made all the acorn bits.

R really wanted to give a necklace to a couple of her friends, so we decided to turn these guys into little Valentine’s goodies. I made and printed out some, “I’m nuts for you!” tags, cut them and and tied them onto the necklaces. That’s it! If you want to make this for a special someone (mother’s day is coming up in a couple months) here’s a link to the Felt Acorns Directions I used, from Honestly WTF. Check out my “I’m nuts for you” printable, and add some necklace chain. Ta dah!

- Chelsey

P. dot. S. You will get pruney fingers. Bleh. Pruney fingers are like someone scratching a chalkboard for me… I can’t handle it. OMG. Eww. After about 5 minutes of playing in the water, I had to go grab some rubber gloves. Gah. Ewww. Pruney toes and fingers are the worst. Also see: I’m a weirdo.

I Love You. Something I tell my husband and daughter everyday. Why not write it out for all to see? I love glitter. A lot. Glitter sorta makes most things better. Feeling bored? Glitter. Need some sparkle? Glitter. Have a cold? Ok, not glitter… but it still makes me happy.

This little bunting will be a quick and fun project for you! I’ve included 3 different colors for you to use. There’s red 1 and red 2. Blue 1 and blue 2. Black 1 and Black 2. I used the red printouts, since I wanted to use red glitter.

How to:

Print out your I Love You printables, preferably onto a heavy card stock. You can also print these out onto printer paper, use a double sided adhesive to glue onto a heavy paper (I used watercolor paper). Cut out your letters.

Evenly rub glue onto the top of each letter, followed by a nice coating of glitter. I like to gently push the glitter down on each letter (hopefully this holds the glitter better). If you see any blank spots, just use a bit of glue and add more glitter (I prefer to use a nice acid-free scrapbook glue, since it’s less likely to warp the paper). Extra tip: keep your sparkly letters up high and out of reach of nosy toddlers… cause they will touch. Hee!

Use a hot glue gun to attach the top of the letters to some ribbon or kitchen twine.

 Hang and enjoy

I love this bunting so much, I really don’t want to take it down after Valentines Day. I think I may hang it in my bedroom. At least for a few months… maybe until it collects too much dust/cat hair. Hee.

Happy Thursday to you!

- Chelsey

ALSO: My friend, Chelsea, also made this I Love You bunting. It’s fantastic.

My kiddo is in preschool…. SO that means Valentines cards! I know I’m more excited about these cards and this whole “holiday” than Miss R, but I know she’ll get more excited on the day. Why? Well, she’ll get a ton of candy. AND, in my kiddo’s world… candy = a good day.

The hardest part of this whole project: getting my child to participate and smile for this photo. She was happy one minute, then I mention taking her photo and it all went downhill. I eventually bribed her with a piece of chocolate. I got ONE sorta smile (see above) and MANY grumpy photos (see last photo).

How to do it:

- Get your kiddo to hold a stick (maybe a broom) and take a photo. We had an old dowel, so that worked. This will help you place the fishing pole (aka stick).

- If you’d like, add the wording “You’re a reel catch!”, or “You’re reel neat!” to the image in photoshop or another photo editing program. OR, you can just handwrite this out on a piece of card stock and tape it to the photo.

- Use an x-acto knife to cut a couple slits to slip in the fishing pole (the sticks I had came from an old floral display). Tape the sticks on the back of the photo to make it more secure.

- Tie a string on the end of the fishing pole, and the other end of the string to a piece of candy. I purchased some swedish fish and individually wrapped them up in saran wrap.

- Print out my free Trout Printout (right and left). Cut them out and tape them to each side of the swedish fish.

- Done!

The whole assembly of this project took about 1 hour (maybe a little longer since kiddo was “helping”). Cost was around $8 for 20 Valentines. Even though this photo below is super grumpy/sassy… I think it’s my favorite. This is pretty much a look she gives me EVERY day. We’ll save these special Valentines for her BFF’s. Hee.

- Chelsey

P.S. if you make this Valentine, please share a photo link in the comments below! I’d love to see it.