Homemade Valentine Cards

This is Spunky's first year in school.  He's my eldest, so I'm learning a lot of new things.  Like, for instance, did you know that there is a "100 day celebration"?  That's this week for us.  I had never heard of such a thing.  Apparently they want to celebrate 100 days of learning, so everyone in my son's kindergarten class is to bring in 100 of something.  It's a big deal to be able to count to 100.  (We're doing fruity O's cereal, left over from our fruit loop garland at Christmas).

Valentines Day is February 14th.  So I just found out that my son has to bring Valentines cards for EVERYONE in his class.  Yep, all 27 of them.  We'll say it is "to celebrate all of our new friends".  I'm not sure why Valentines is such a big deal, but it is.

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So I have been scouring the web looking for free printables (there are some great ones out there), but then I thought - hey, I'm creative - these don't need to be complex - just make some!  So I did just that.  (Most of the ones pictured here were free downloads I found on Skip to My Lou and Bunnycakes).

I've got issues with traditional Valentines.  First of all, my son does not "get" puns.  He doesn't "get" jokes, either, for that matter.  He's just not there yet.  Second, this is marked as the holiday of "love".  Love is not exactly politically correct in the schools - I mean, we are to love one another, but we can't actually say that because it comes straight from the Bible.  Third, what's up with "conversation hearts"?  Some of these poor kids can't even speak English, they're just learning to read the correct way, and then this holiday comes along and throws them cryptic and incorrect spelling?  Talk about confusing!

So what's a mom to do?  I don't want to go overboard on the "crafty" end (a kindergartener making 27 cards by hand?  yeah, right - guess who would be finishing THAT project!!!)  So lets just keep it simple!  Here's what I came up with.

A simple picture (mine were Tombots - a free font), with "Happy Valentines Day".  We'll probably throw a sticker or two on them.  Perhaps some glitter (if I decide I'd like to go completely insane).

"these MINE!"

Oh, and I have decided that I'm going to type out the kids names.  See, my son's class is extremely diverse in culture.  So there are about 20 kids with names I had never heard of.  The teacher actually "practices" saying some of them with the class so they can pronounce them...

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I love that Spunky's  class is multi-cultural.  Seriously, I have absolutely nothing against people from other nations.  I'm just a momma thinking about practicality.  Can you imagine how long it would take my five year old (who hates writing) to spell out "Abdoulamohamman"?!!! We'd be working on that one all night.

And just so you are not confused, yes, this is my daughter.  I know this post is about my son and his class, but he was at school while I was planning this post (and getting the Valentines ready), so Sunshine and I decided to "play".

Have a very happy Friday!
:) Caren