Confession: I love Valentine's Day crafts

Where I sometimes feel the Mommy Wars most predominantly is when the voices in my head (mind you, no one has ever said this out loud) start to ridicule my proclivity for being an over-the-top Valentine’s Day school card exchange mom. First of all, there is a certain  “I-refuse-to-be-a-part-of-a-Hallmark-holiday” mentality that I get and that I feel like I should perhaps embrace, but yet can’t because I love hearts and love and the color red. Second, there is this weird opportunity to do awesome crafts with your kids that I simply can't resist. But then I worry if I’m overly excited about this I’ll be judged as “one of those” moms who clearly has too much time on her hands. (Over think much?)

The truth is, I just love to make things with my kids. That’s it. Some of us like to toss baseballs with our offspring, some of us play board games, some of us color. Long story short, I won’t raise an eyebrow at your store-bought Valentine’s if you won’t judge me for the ones we spent Monday afternoon making. Our merits as mothers do not align with our expression of V-day love.

• Oliver, who is obsessed with Minecraft, chose a Minecraft theme. We bought candy that looked semi-dynamite/fire ball(?) like, filled baggies, and attached little Minecraft images, which I bought and downloaded on Etsy HERE.  Fun!
• Eli received a bag of little cars for Christmas and after looking at Pinterest for ideas for car-themed Valentine’s, we came up with the slogan “I like how you roll,” which I created on Pages and printed out.
• Sintayehu used Eli's idea for last year's Valentine’s Day goodies. She picked out the paper in the craft aisle, I punched holes and glued eyeballs, and she write her name, which happens to be her very favorite activity these days. (“S for Sinta!!!!!” She says at every ‘S’ siting.)