Valentine's Day Activities for Kids
Although Valentine’s Day is known as a celebratory day of love for spouses and partners, it can still be a super fun day for kids. If you have school-aged children, you are likely gathering items for your child’s classroom celebrations, but how are you celebrating at home? There are so many ways you can enjoy the holiday with your kids to instill the importance of showing love, gratitude, and appreciation for their future partners one day. Keep reading to learn more about Valentine’s Day activities for kids that the whole family will love, including how to incorporate some of our famous sensory toys!
Looking for Fun Ways to Celebrate Valentine’s Day?
In addition to the United States, Valentine’s Day is celebrated in Canada, Mexico, the United Kingdom, France, and Australia. In Great Britain, Valentine’s Day began to be popularly celebrated around the 17th century.
By the middle of the 18th, it was common for friends and lovers of all social classes to exchange small tokens of affection or handwritten notes, and by 1900, printed cards began to replace written letters due to improvements in printing technology.
Ready-made cards were an easy way for people to express their emotions in a time when direct expression of one’s feelings was discouraged. Cheaper postage rates also contributed to an increase in the popularity of sending Valentine’s Day greetings.
[source: https://www.history.com/topics/valentines-day/history-of-valentines-day-2 ]
It’s easy to figure out how to celebrate Valentine’s Day with your partner. Quality time, flowers, chocolates, or gifts are all popular go-tos, but how do you celebrate with kids?
Fun and Simple Valentine's Day Activities for Kids
If you want to celebrate Valentine’s Day with your kids, there are tons of fun activities you can choose from. Some of our favorites include DIY family Valentines, scavenger hunts, a family date night, and a Valentine’s Day-themed sensory bin!
DIY Family Valentines
A great way to celebrate Valentine’s Day by involving the whole family is to create DIY Valentines for each other! Each member of the family can have a hand at crafting Valentines for every member so that everyone gets more than one and feels extra special.
A great idea is to add gratitude notes to each Valentine, saying something you love or appreciate about that person. It will help teach your little on that words matter, kind words feel good, and that effectively showing your appreciation for someone can be simple and easy!
Whether it is simply coloring a card if you have a toddler or making something more elaborate with your school-aged child, DIY family Valentines are a great tradition. Watching how they evolve over time is also super special and fun, too!
Scavenger Hunt
A great way to celebrate Valentine’s Day with kids is to set up a scavenger hunt for them!
It can be super simple: All you need to do is small paper hearts in different colors and hide them around the house. Set the timer for 20 minutes and let your child find as many hearts as they can (inspiration by Kidpillar), or use chocolate hearts instead!
If you want to do something more elaborate for a school-aged kiddo, give them a bigger gift (such as sensory toys, flowers, or candy) and leave clues around the house. Don’t have time or have a clever enough brain to come up with cute clues? We found some easy printables right here. https://wunder-mom.com/valentines-day-scavenger-hunt/
Family Date Night
What is a better way to spend Valentine’s Day with your loved ones than to have a family date night? Going out is always fun, but if you have toddlers or don’t enjoy the hustle and bustle of busy restaurants and other establishments on Valentine’s Day, there are plenty of ways to enjoy it at home!
Here are some ideas:
| Cook a meal together |
| Watch a movie together |
| Pick flowers as a family |
| Have a picnic |
| Go out for ice cream |
| Set up tents in the living room |
| Make a special dessert to enjoy together |
Valentine’s Day Themed Sensory Bin
In addition to setting up Valentine’s crafts, a cute heart-shaped meal, or having a family date night, you can create a fun and easy Valentine’s Day-themed sensory bin for your kids! Sensory bins are notorious for being dirty, messy, and take a long time to set up compared to how long kids tend to play with them. However, Spike Sensory Toys help make sensory bins fun, easy, mess-free, and quick to set up.
Spike Sensory Toys
All Spike sensory toys are made of silicone, which is naturally antimicrobial, odor-resistant, and super easy to clean and sanitize. This means you can add them to the bath or a water sensory bin, too!
Everyone, young and ol,d can enjoy SPIKE, especially those with Autism Spectrum Disorder, anxiety, focusing issues, ADD, ADHD, sensory processing disorders, and other attention issues.
Perfect for the classroom as a discreet fidget toy, at home, or in the office, as they are quiet and non-distracting for others.
Spike toys offer tons of textures, sensory feedback, and ASMR tingles for people of all ages. No matter which Spike toy you pick up, it is almost impossible to put it down!
For more parenting tips, holiday ideas, and family-friendly products, visit us at Innobaby.com!