Fun and low-waste Valentine’s Day activities for kids
Any holiday is a chance to encourage your kids to try new activities, and Valentine’s Day is no exception! This year we upped our game for my son’s valentines by including a fine-motor skill and attention activity that has been a huge hit!
When I’m looking for holiday activities, I try to balance fun and convenience with prioritizing natural materials and keeping it as low-waste as possible. The following activities are my version of that balance for this busy mom and my boys, ages four and one-and-a-half.
Handmade felt Valentine lacing activity
Just as I began to think about Valentine’s Day in mid-January, I saw felt heart lacing kits at Target in the dollar section. Felt is a natural material that’s often used in Waldorf crafting and it pops up in Arthur’s preschool activities sometimes. I knew this was as good of a win as this busy mom could find!
The kits I found were pretty straight-forward: Three hearts and three strings of yarn with a plastic needle. You use the needle to thread the yarn through the punched-out holes around the border of the heart to make any pattern you desire!
The kit says ages 6+, but at Arthur’s Waldforf-inspired preschool, I see kids as young as three wielding a real needle and know that they are capable of these skills with practice.
My brilliant little boy has some sensory processing and fine motor skill delays, and so I look for every opportunity I can to challenge him in sneaky ways that are fun! And though this activity tested the patience of both of us at times, his skills and attention gradually improved and we were both so proud that he made two dozen of these hearts for his friends!
There are all kinds of these lacing kits at Target (mine are still in my store as of February 8!), Michael’s, and other craft stories, but I’m sure you could make them with large sheets of felt, a stencil, and a whole punch for much cheaper and almost zero packaging waste! My hope is that these hearts we made could get played with, displayed, or even turned into a second-time craft by his friends!
Natural Valentine’s Day basket
As I was looking around for ideas of what to use to display some Valentine’s Day goodies for the boys, I realized that I was falling into the disposable, plastic-based hunt that easily consumes many of us during seasonable holidays. We want something cute and easy. But what if it could be reusable and multi-purpose instead?!
So this sent me on the quest to find a solution. And I stumbled upon the idea of using natural baskets with play silks! Mine are currently being shipped to me now, and I will update this post with my images once I get everything together. But my boys will be able to use these baskets for their toys all year AND use the silks with their blocks, animals, peg dolls, fort building, and more imaginative play.
The drawback is the initial investment–we’re talking probably $40-50 for materials versus $15. However, we’re getting play and storage items in the process, and not more junk that has to sit in a storage tote in our garage (which my husband would say is a win). My goal was to look for items second-hand, but I forgot to prioritize it and that idea fell through the cracks. But I’m so excited for this new experiment and to see how the boys react!
Valentines’ Day sensory bins
As long as you have a base on hand (black beans, rice, or even slime) and general tools such as funnels, scoops, tongs, and more, you can improvise to make a bin that’s holiday-specific. Here are some lower-waste ideas for a special love-themed bin:
- Felt hearts
- Wooden hearts
- Pom poms
- Felt hearts
- Beads
- Silk flowers
- Valentine’s cookie cutters
- Silicone heart molds
- And much more!
Valentine’s Day art cards
I love making “useful” crafts, and we’ll turn those beautiful pink and red paintings with stickers into a card for neighbor/friend/daddy/grandma and grandpa! And just a reminder, card-making can be filled with all kinds of fine-motor-skill activities such as:
- Cutting
- Gluing
- removing sticker backs and placing on the paper
- Tracing heart shapes
- Painting
And to keep it lower waste, we start with scrap paper and bits of materials we might already have. For instance, I have a giant pad of once-ambitious scrapbooking patterned papers I’ve had for 10 years (shown above) and we still aren’t even halfway through it! New projects don’t always need new materials but when they require them, I just try to plan as carefully as I can! <3
What are some of your family’s favorite sensory, fine motor skill, or low-waste crafts? Share them below!
