Upcycled Valentines

Are you looking for a way to upcycle your Christmas cards? With Valentines Day right around the corner, we’ve got you covered for some fun activities you can do with your children at home, or with your students. In fact, one of the activities is great for teachers too!

In a normal, non-pandemic year, we at Deep Blue Cleanup, encourage teachers to make their own Valentines for their students out of upcycled Christmas cards and cereal boxes. Here’s how you can make your upcycled Valentine cards out of December’s Christmas cards, and we promise they’ll be a hit with your students! Most importantly you’ll be teaching them how to take care of their planet and keep shiny, sparkly cards out of landfill. Recycling paper takes so much water, so we want to minimize recycling as much as we can- upcycling is always a better alternative!

For this activity, you will need Scissors, an assortment of Christmas cards, a glue stick, markers and a cereal box. These supplies will make 1 large and two small cards (alternatively, you can make 6 small cards).  The big card can go to a teacher, and the small cards can go to classmates- if you are a parent guiding your child to make upcycled Valentine’s Day cards.

 Steps

1)    Cut hearts, or x and o’s out of your Christmas cards. 

2)    Cut the cereal box and glue the colorful part of the cereal boxes together, making two brown sides for the card. Fold it in half, and there’s your base.

3)    Start gluing your hearts and x’s and o’s onto the card.

4)    Write your message inside the card.

This is a fun activity for our kindergarten students, who are learning to spell their names.  They can have a blast making a caterpillar out of upcycled hearts that they cut out of their Christmas cards. 

Steps

1)Cut hearts out of each Christmas card (use one heart as a stencil so they’re all the same size)

2) Cut out the side of an Amazon box (or other box)

3) Glue the hearts on the cardboard

4) Write each letter of your name on the hearts and draw a face on the last heart.

5)Draw the legs and you’re done!