Valentines Day Treat Bags

I normally wait to post my projects till Friday, but I figured if maybe one of you wanted to do this little project for Valentine's day, by Friday it'd be too late. So here it is (and please forgive my dark photos, we completed this after dinner). My son really really wanted to hand make his Valentine's Day cards, and I was somewhat reluctant to let him, simply because I know him, and knew that about three cards in he'd be over it (and he needs sixteen cards total). So I've been thinking for a while about a simple project for him. My first idea was to have him draw one card and take it to Kinkos and size it down and make 16 copies. But then I saw some cute goodie bags and decided to try to make something similar. I knew I had some small blank cards (if my memory serves me right, I believe they are from Michael's, in their wedding section as thank you cards but any thicker kind of paper would suffice), and my initial idea was to get the kids some stickers and let them have at it. I wanted just plain red hearts. Which no one carries! Who knew? I found guinea pigs with hearts, words with hearts, foam glitter three dimensional hearts, but plain 'ol red hearts were no where to be found. I was about to give up when I happened across the dollar corner at Michael's and my son found a stamp. We started digging through the bin and turned up these five cute little stamps. Normally rubber stamps can be pricey (and honestly? hokey), but these were only a dollar! And adorable! We grabbed five and a red stamp pad and headed home.

I let the kids have at it with the cards (and complete disclosure, ended up putting finishing touches on some). My son loves to type on our old typewriter, so I let him type on a few cards before we both ran out of patience and I finished the rest. The result definitely has handmade charm, no two are the same, and nothing is perfect or precious. But I think they turned out adorable and he's really proud of them, so thats all that really matters.

I stuck some Kashi crackers in a bag to show you how they'll look when we add our real treats (rice crispy treats made with pink strawberry "smarshmallows" as my three year old calls them). For some more ideas and free downloads and printables, check out this awesome list on The Long Thread. Happy crafting!