Do you decorate for Valentine’s Day? We typically don’t, but this Valentine garland idea came up as we dug through our art supplies to see what weekend craft we could come up with. We had a bag of wooden beads, some string and felt hearts from last year.
Always fun to find a project that all the kids can get involved with. Watching them create and display something they are proud of makes me happy! It’s also nice to be able to remove the heart details and reuse the garland for other holidays too.
Skills: lots of great skills to practice! This project can help foster
- Fine motor skills
- Hand-eye coordination
- Focus
- Creativity
- Math concepts
- Color Recognition
- Problem-solving
- Social skills
- Patience
- Sensory exploration
Our four kids range in age from 5-13 and they were all able to participate in creating and design or helping a younger sibling.
Make-it-easy materials
- Wooden beads in various sizes(or you can sub in dry pasta noodles)
- Felt sheets in Valentine’s Day colors. You can also cut the hearts out of paper if your Dollar Store doesn’t have pre-cut.
- Twine, string or ribbon
- Scissors
- Tape
- Optional: Paint and brushes for customizing beads. We kept ours natural but painting the beads would be very pretty! It also helps with creating patterns.
Setting up the workspace
Before diving in, create a kid-friendly crafting area. Cover surfaces with newspaper or a plastic tablecloth to catch any mess if painting. Organize materials in separate containers to make it easy for little hands to find what they need. Let the kids sort by shape or color and get them starting to think about patterns.
Step 1: Creating the Valentine garland bead strand
Choose your beads for the Valentine garland. Let the kids pick a variety of sizes and colors that they like. To make it easier to thread the beads, wrap a piece of tape tightly around the end of your twine, creating a point. Then start threading the beads onto the string, creating a pattern or mixing colors as desired. This step allows the kids to work on a number of great skills!
Even our kiddo with a broken arm was able to string the beads!
Step 2: Crafting felt hearts
Now, let’s move onto the felt hearts. Using the scissors, let the kids cut out heart shapes from the felt sheets. We got ours from the Dollar Store and were pre-cut. The kids glued them together in sets of three. You can also sub in paper hearts. Let the kids experiment with different sizes and colors. You can take it to the next level by letting the kids decorate the hearts with crayons, stickers or glitter if you are brave!
Step 3: Combining beads and hearts
Once you have strung your beads, move onto hanging your felt hearts wherever you like on your garland. We chose to offset ours to one side and used fishing line to attach them.
Step 4: Display your valentine garland!
Once your garland is complete, hang it proudly on your mantle or around the house! It’s fun to see our younger kids so proud of the work they did. Especially since we hung it on full display on the mantle. It builds confidence in them when their art is displayed in a prime spot!
Tips for a smooth crafting experience
- Supervision: Always supervise young children during the crafting process, especially when using scissors or small beads.
- Creativity is Key: Encourage kids to think outside the box and experiment with different combinations of beads and hearts.
- Share the Love: Consider making extra garlands to share with neighbors, grandparents, or classmates. It’s a fun way to spread love!