Free Kawaii Valentine Printable

I spent the better part of last week working on making this cute Kawaii inspired sheet of Valentines that you can print for free.  Just click on the image to download or print the PDF.  I've also included a second sheet of Valentines that could be used alone or as a backing for these.  You could print them out for an old fashioned Valentine's exchange or use them for cute gift tags.  Enjoy!!
EDIT- I know some folks are having problems downloading the file if you click here you should be able to download it.

-Kim

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Tiny Valentine Mailbox

Looking for a fun way to deliver those cute tiny Valentine love notes we made yesterday?  I’ve assembled these tiny mini mailboxes that hold a little note plus some of your favorite chocolates for your sweetie.  If you would like to make your own, I’ll show you how.  These are super easy to assemble in only a few minutes, and I’ve made a little tutorial of sorts.

Mini Mailbox Tutorial

You will need:
Mini Mailbox Template  Download HERE (I’m no artist, so please don’t judge the roughness of my sketch.)
4 x 6 sheet of cardstock (Or scraps big enough to cut the template from.)
Glue Stick (Or adhesive of your choice)
1 Brad (optional)
Small Hole Punch (optional)

  Step #1, cut the pattern from the template.

Step #2, fold up the ends of the rectangle 3/4-inch.

Step #3, glue the folded end.

Step #4, glue the folded ends down on the bottom piece at the marks from the template.

Step #5, fold up the tabs on the bottom piece.

Step #6, fold both ends inside the dome to get a nice tight fold.

Step #7, pull the folds out, and place glue on the three tabs.

Step #8, push the tabs into the end.  Go in through the other side and push the the tabs against the dome to get a nice adhesion.

Step #9, make a hole to insert your brad.

Step #10, assemble your flag pole.  If you don’t have a brad or a hole puncher, you can glue on your flag pole.  I used a heart punch to make the heart on top, but you can make an arrow or standard flag or come up with something creative.

Step #11, make a pull tab for the door of your mailbox, or, as I did above, make a small hole in the top of your dome and a small hole in your door and thread ribbon through for a closure.

Happy Valentine making, D.I.Y.’ers! 
~julee~

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Tiny Love Notes

I’m a tiny bit in love with these tiny love notes. 

I mean really, I’m kind of dying from the cuteness over here. 

The heart is from a paper punch, but if you’re interested in making your own tiny envelopes, here is a tutorial of sorts.  Actually, this is more of a pictorial of sorts. 

Tiny Envelope Tutorial

You can use any size square to make these envelopes, but for these tiny envelopes I used 2in x 2in.  Hopefully your paper will have a straighter edge than mine did.  You’ll also need a glue stick.  And if precision is your thing, grab your ruler and scissors, too.

*For step # 9, you’re opening that little triangle fold and then smooshing it down onto itself.  This is your closure.

*Step 10-11 isn’t completely necessary, but I’m a fan of the glue stick.  You’re not gluing down the 3/4 strip, you’re only gluing down the flaps.  So, only place a bit of glue on the 3/4 strip, and only glue the flaps down.  Got it?  Don’t glue the little closure, you’re gonna need that to keep the top flap closed.  I forgot to add a picture of this, but after gluing, fold the flaps back in like picture #9.

Happy Valentine making, D.I.Y.’ers!

~julee~

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Free D.I.Y. Louisville Valentine

For you my loves.  A free Valentine's Day printable.  I drew this cute little V-Day goody just for you guys, you can print it as a card or use it as an embroidery design.  Click here to get it.

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Valentine's Day Gifts For Kids

Even though I have stated that I am not a huge Valentine's day person, I do enjoy giving and making gifts to the people that I love during this time of year and that goes doubly for the kids in my life.  One super easy and cheap gift idea is making play clay.  This is a great natural, non-toxic recipe that kids will love to play with for hours.  You can make play clay in about 5 minutes, package it up in an airtight container with a few heart shaped cookie cutters and you have a cute, inexpensive gift for kids.  You can also add a few drops of essential oil to the play clay to make smelly clay :)

Recipe
Play Clay:

1 c. all purpose flour
1 c. water
1/2 c. salt
1 tsp. vegetable oil
1/2 tsp. cream of tarter
paste food color

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Valentine's Day Cupcakes, Quick and Easy

I love cupcakes.  I think I like making and decorating and looking at cupcakes even more than I like eating them.  I also like conversation hearts, not so much to eat but just for the cute factor.  So when I saw the jumbo size hearts I couldn't resist, they just screamed cupcake toppers to me.  You can use any recipe or box mix that you want, but I think Red Velvet or strawberry would be particularly cute.  I also want to make these and match the icing colors to the hearts, so you might be seeing that on here soon :)  I just used a standard butter cream recipe and piped it onto these and then stuck a jumbo heart into each one.

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Red Velvet Cake Balls and Handmade Candy Boxes

If you are looking for a great alternative to boring store bought candy this year for Valentine's Day, cake balls are a great alternative.  I made a batch in Red Velvet, feel free to oooh and ahhh now.  I shaped them and decorated them to resemble traditional Valentine's candy.  These are a great start for anyone who is a little intimidated by traditional candy making, plus they are a nice little surprise when you bite into them.

Red Velvet Cake Balls

1 box Red Velvet Cake Mix
1 can cream cheese frosting

Bake cake according to instructions in a 9x13 inch pan.  Let cool and crumble up into a bowl.  Add the can of frosting and mix it all together.  Using a teaspoon or candy scoop make small balls of the mixture, you can shape them into heart shapes, squares and rectangles like I did if you choose or just do the ball shapes.  Put them in the freezer for 10-20 minutes and then dip in melted chocolate or candy melts and top with Valentine's sprinkles.

For the box, I followed these simple origami instructions found here, the only thing I changed was I used a 12x12 sheet of scrapbook paper for the top of my box and trimmed a piece to 11x11 to use as the bottom of my box.  A box this size holds about 5 or 6 cake balls if you do one layer, I did two and just cut a piece of paper to separate  the layers.

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Pretty In Pink, Local Artist Round Up

As thoughts are turning to Valentine's Day, I thought we would gather up some of our favorite items from local artists. I'm not usually a pink girl, but these items make me think otherwise.

Pretty pink grapefruit soap from modmadme

Sweet little pink and purple hat from clamors

Felted purse in shades of pink from needlesandKims

Love this pink herringbone neck warmer from ohmaudlinme

These are so pretty, I love the vintage feel, from cherryandviolet

This cowl looks so cozy and I love all the variegated tones in it, from whirlwend

Also check out WHY Louisville's selection of Valentine's Day Cards here

For a special treat check out this great free Valentine's day printable from the lovely and local, Craft E Magee   She has two styles that you can print on her blog for free!

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Valentine D.I.Y. On The Cheap

I don't know about you, but Valentine's Day is not usually the type of thing I get big time excited about.  I mean it's cool and all, but I just don't feel the need to deck my whole house out in hearts and flowers.  We have seriously zero V-day decorations.  This year I guess I am feeling it a little more because I've been inspired to make a few things for our house and I even have been daydreaming of throwing a little party all decked out in red and white stripes and maybe a little aqua thrown in.  I think maybe it's the dreary winter that is making all the red and pink seem more appealing.  So the other night while brainstorming I came up with a really cheap (free for me)  decoration idea.  I've seen some of these rose adorned heart decorations around at stores and at first considered buying some silk flowers and giving it a go, but that didn't seem crafty enough.  Then I remembered this giant roll of velvet ribbon that I had been hoarding.  I got it out and played around and the following was born.

Valentine's Rose Heart

Materials
large velvet ribbon or any other kind of ribbon
cardboard
hot glue
a small piece of ribbon for the bow and for hanging

You might have some of this left over from Christmas, if not you can buy it for really cheap or just use another ribbon you have.

Cut a 2 foot length and fold it in half the entire length.  Then start slowly, tightly wrapping it.

after you have wrapped it a few times begin folding it back and forth as you wrap it.  This will give the rose a little more realistic look.  However, you could just wrap the entire thing with no flips if you like.

Keep wrapping until you reach the end of your length of ribbon.  Add a little hot glue to hold it together.

Using some cardboard (mine was a gift box) cut out a heart shape.

Start hot gluing  the roses to the cardboard.  Work around the outside first and then fill in the center.

Keep gluing until the cardboard is totally covered.  Attach a piece of ribbon to hang it from and add a bow in a coordinating color.  Note: I made several rose buds by using a 10 inch piece of ribbon and the same technique.  These helped to fill in any holes that I had.

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