Valentine's Party Ideas

I happen to love little kid parties. When else can you be silly and loud and run around jammin' out with homemade musical instruments without people thinking you have simply lost it?

So, whether you're one of the party animals helping out with a school Valentine's bash, or just want some fun ideas to do with your little Ranch Creekers at home, here are a few of my favorite Valentine party ideas floating around...

CRAFTS inexpensive. simple. creative.

Felt Heart Bookmarks

Paper Plate Heart Music Shakers

Button Heart Ornament


Paper Heart Headband {this could be WAY cuter when decorated with our stellar RCE students' creativity - but I like the idea.}

Valentine Pillow {the prep for this is pretty time consuming, but I did this for a service project for a Kindergarten class 2 years ago, and it was worth it! We took the finished pillows to St. Francis Med. Center and gave them to hospitalized children.}
GAMES Simple & Kid friendly

Valentine's Day Heart Relay Race
Cut out a bunch of different-colored hearts and write different actions on them (e.g., hop, crawl, skip, walk backwards, dance, tiptoe, crab walk, etc.). Make 2 sets of hearts with exactly the same instructions, and place the hearts in 2 decorated boxes {one set in each box of course}.
Divide the kids into two relay teams.
Each player must run to their team’s box, pick a heart, read the directions, and following the directions either hop, skip or jump back to their team. {if there is an uneven number, have one child go twice to make the teams even}.
The team that finishes first wins. High fives all around!
Note: for older kids you can make the game a little more difficult by having them pick the hearts out of the box, one at a time, using chopsticks.

Valentine Freeze Dance Bring your cd player or ipod speakers and play songs with the word "love" in them, and have the kids bust a move to the tunes. Turn the music off during different times in the song, at which time they must freeze in their current position. If they move at all, then they are "out." The kids who are still in the game continue to dance/freeze as you control the music, until one person wins.

Sense-Sational Add a little science project flare to the party! Fill numbered paper bags with a variety of items that have an aroma that has to do with Valentine’s Day such as cinnamon, chocolate, roses, etc. Be sure the smells are familiar to the age group. Let the kids smell them without looking inside. After they record their guesses, have them share their answers and see who got the most right.

Cupid Says Play this game the same way as you would pay "Simon Says."


How Many Words Give each student a sheet of paper printed out with famous couples' names. (Bill & Hillary Clinton, Fred & Wilma Flinstone, John & Abigail Adams, etc}. Ask each person to make as many words as they can out of the letters in the names you've given them. Give them a time limit, and then share & compare answers.

Heart Attack Buy a pad {or two} of heart sticky notes. Before the party, stick them all over the classroom, under desks, on windows, etc. etc. Give the kids a countdown, and then let them race to collect as many hearts as they can. Have each individual count up how many hearts they collected. Make a note on the board of each student's number, and then let them figure out the huge addition problem to determine how many total hearts were gathered.

STORY TIME just a few faves

Somebody Loves You, Mr. Hatch by Eileen Soinneli

Guess How Much I Love You, by Sam McBratney

Valentine's Day by Anne Rockwell

Happy Silliness. Happy Loudness. Happy Valentine's Day Partying! xoxo, Cumorah