Let’s make a simple Valentine’s Day heart suncatcher craft!
This heart suncatcher craft is always one of my favorite Valentine’s Day crafts for kids! They such a simple craft for kids do this time of year! Plus they are easy enough that both toddlers and preschool-aged kids can easily make them. With Valentine’s Day heading our way I decided it was time to get out the supplies and make some of these festive window decorations with my daycare kids!
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Valentine’s Day Heart Suncatcher Craft
Materials needed for heart suncatcher craft:
- Heart-shaped cookie cutters
- Glue (we used both white & clear)
- Beads or Gems
- Wax paper
I gave each of my daycare girls a heart-shaped cookie cutter on wax paper and let them choose the glue they wanted to use. I recommend you put the wax paper on a pan or cutting board so you don’t have to transfer them to a counter or other area to dry which can cause the glue to leak out.
They LOVE to squeeze glue (really what kid doesn’t?) and they thought this was so awesome because they got to fill the whole heart with lots of glue!
After they filled the heart with glue I gave them the tray of craft gems/beads and let them fill up their hearts with them. It’s super easy! They just have to select their beads and then drop them into the glue.
When we’re done we set them on the counter to dry. Also, it’s important to note that this heart suncatcher craft does take a few days to dry. Ours literally took about 4 days to fully dry before I could pop them out of the cookie cutters.
Tip: Let them dry for a few days
When it’s dry pull the wax paper off the back, cut the excess glue from around the outside of the cookie-cutter, and then just pop out the dried hearts. I added a pipe cleaner by poking it through the dried glue, only one was to firm and required I use a knife to poke the hole.
The regular white glue looks a bit cloudy or frosted but it does seem to dry a bit firmer than the clear glue. Of course, it could be related to the portions that were used too as the child that used the clear glue didn’t fill her heart with as much glue as the child that used the white glue.
We’re going to be making more because the girls all had such a great time and they look so pretty!
We also made a Christmas Tree version using glue and cookie cutters.
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Such a great idea! It’s such a creative spin on sun-catchers! I particularly like that there’s no plastic melting smell that you have to worry about – love it <3
Thanks Katie! Yes no plastic smell! Much better than trying to keep the doors open to disburse the smell on a chilly day!
I love this idea- but how would you go about doing this with 24 children (2 classes of 12 each)? I don’t think I could come up with 24 cookie cutters. Have you ever used something recycled to put the glue in, and would it pop out when dry? (I am thinking plastic jar lids). I think these would make neat Mother’s Day gifts!
In my center days we did it in groups of 6 (we had up to 20-24 total depending on the day) and that was manageable for us with our age group. I have done it in plastic lids, they are a bit harder to get to come loose (for us the metal lids from glass jars were the worst) but they turned out great too. We had to stick the ones from larger lids under a book for a few days after they had dried because the edges curled up a bit.
I just bought heart cookie cutters at Wal-mart last night. There was 6 cookie cutters for $1.47. They were over in the Valentine aisle. I am doing it with 20 students.
Yay! Good luck!
I made “snow flakes” by filling the bottom of plastic disposable bowls (SOLO dishware) with glue and having the kids add white stuff…glitter, tissue paper, etc. It worked really well. I wonder if you could do the same thing with these, and then cut out the heart shape when they dry? You might have to use smaller items like sequins instead of beads, but it might work.
We’ve made these using plastic lids instead of cookie cutters, we wanted a round shape at the time, but the dried glue is very easy to cut so I’m sure you could cut it into whatever shape you wanted. Your snowflakes sound like a cute idea! 🙂
It was a totally working those fine motor skills! Especially since I didn’t open the cap all the way so they had to squeeze just a tiny bit harder to get the glue to come pouring out! 😉
I love how doable this idea is, and the results are cute! Pinning
Thanks! It’s super easy! 🙂
We love beads over here and what a fun way to put them to use. Last time we tried a glue craft to make a snowman we made the mistake of not using enough glue. We’ll not make that mistake again! Very pretty!!
What a simple and fun craft! Thanks for sharing via Family Fun Friday.
Instead of using regular glue can you use modge podge? I have a whole jar of it that i have been trying to find a use for…. this is such a cute idea btw cant wait to make some with my son.
I’m not sure if mod podge would dry solidly enough, but I’ve never experimented with it in that way so I’m not really sure. 🙂 Let us know how it works if you try it!
Super cute. Could we use mod Podge too?
I’m not sure if Mod Podge would work, it’s similar to glue but a bit more watered down so I’m not sure how solid it would be when dried, but it’s definitely with a try.
I love this! I had no idea it would be so easy to make a lovely suncatcher with the kids. I think we will try this tomorrow.
I would love for you to hop over and share with us at Tell Me About It Tuesday.
(http://www.sweetsillysara.com/2014/01/tell-me-about-it-tuesday-3.html)
That is totally awesome! I never would have thought you could just use glue. What a great way to get the younger kids involved in the crafting. Thanks for sharing at Mom’s Library!
I bet it would be pretty to tint the glue pink…either the white or the clear, but I think I’ll try clear.
I bet the pink would be great too! Maybe even use some colored glitter glue!
So pretty: I bet they were such fun to make! Thanks for linking up to the #getyourcrafton challenge 🙂
This is so cute! And is looks easy like another person comment. Is also a great activity idea for nannies to do with the kids and give it to their parents for valentines day 😉
I’ve always wanted to try doing these. The came out great! Pinning 🙂
Thank you for sharing this with us on We Love Weekends last week. Your lovely suncatchers have been highlighted and I really do hope to make some of our own next week! http://peaklepie.com/finding-time-wlw-3112014/ Please feel free to join us again soon and share some more of your family friendly posts!
Thanks for highlighting them! And do try to make them! They are super easy and fun! 🙂
I tried this but had HEAPS of trouble getting it out of the cookie cutter 🙁 I had to hack at it with a knife so the edges look terrible… What did we do wrong?
Oh no! So sorry to hear this happened! I’m not sure what the issue may be as ours just popped right out but maybe I can offer a few troubleshooting ideas? Was it kind of stretchy or very solid? One of ours, the clear one, wasn’t as solid as the others (she used less glue and we took it out a day earlier) so as you can see in the picture the edge of the top ripped a bit when it popped out. The other ones we popped out just after they had dried and I’ve noticed that they have gotten even harder so maybe your glue hardened faster? Also ours leaked a bit so prior to popping them out I cut around the outside of the cookie cutter (to clear the excess) and that seemed to loosen them up a bit too. Hopefully you can give it a go again and it will behave better for you! It’s such a disappointment when they don’t turn out!
Thanks so much for your reply! I’ve noticed it’s hardened more since yesterday. Perhaps I should have left it longer (I left it 4 days)… Did you use metal or plastic cutters? I used metal. Did you put it in the sun to dry?
I will definitely try this again tomorrow… I’m determined to get it right for my little girl, she loved making it so much!
We used metal ones, they have a bit of a smooth coating on them so maybe that helped? I didn’t leave ours in the sun to dry as it was rainy and nasty at the time we made them. They just sat on the kitchen counter for a few days. Good luck! 🙂
These are adorable, affordable and sure to be fun to make.
Thank you for stopping by the Thoughtful Spot Weekly Blog Hop this week. We hope to see you drop by our neck of the woods next week!
I LOVE this idea! Such a clever twist on the glue craft – it turned out beautiful! I featured it this week on TGIF. (http://www.123homeschool4me.com/2014/02/valentines-day-crafts-for-kids-and-tgif.html)
Thanks for sharing your creativity with the rest of us! Hope to see you linked up again later today.
Have a great weekend,
Beth =)
Thanks so much for featuring it! We really enjoyed making them!
How did you get the hole in it for the pipe cleaner?
I just poked the pipe cleaner through the glue, it easily poked through but if yours is harder I’d just use a knife or pen to poke a small hole 🙂
My kids are going to love this activity. I’m so glad you shared this at our All Things Valentines link up this month. We are going to have our All Things Spring Link Up open beginning Feb. 28th – http://wp.me/p3wgIf-xF – hope you come join the party and share your Spring-y posts!
Love this idea! I can’t wait to do this with the soon to be 2. She will have fun!
Those are absolutely beautiful! Mine made Christmas ornaments with glue this year…I can’t wait to try this with them!
I tried this tonight and the glue leaked all out of the cookie cutter and I even put something heavy on top to get it to stay. Did I do something wrong?
Oh no! How disappointing! Sorry to hear it didn’t work out! We had this problem with one cookie cutter when we made our Christmas Tree versions just last month. In our case it turned out that the metal cookie cutter was slightly bent which allowed the glue to leak out and once we straightened it out it worked fine. My only other guess would be that the glue was a little too runny maybe? But that’s just a shot in the dark based on experiences I’ve had with Elmer’s glue. If it’s not your cookie cutter (or even if it is but you can’t straighten it) another idea might be to run a line of hot glue around the inside to act as a barrier and prevent the glue from leaking. Hope this helps and you get it to work! <3
We put the glue in the cookie cutter but it kept seeping out. How do you prevent this? Or does it eventually start to solidify and stop spreading? I used the clear glue. Should I use the white glue instead?
We didn’t have an issue with our clear glue when we made the hearts but when we made our Christmas version we ran into this issue because out metal cookie cutter was slightly bent. Once we bent it back it worked fine, I put a heavy book on it when it was drying to make sure it stayed flush against the table. Maybe run a bead of hot glue around the inner edge? I know consistency varies a bit from brand to brand when it comes to glue but I’ve also heard that if you leave the lid off your glue for a day or so it causes some of the water to evaporate and makes the glue thicker. Hope this helps!
I was very excited to do this project with my preschoolers for Valentines. They had a great time squeezing out glue and adding beads. However only 2 out of 12 hearts came out correctly. Most of the glue ran out from under the cookie cutter, we added more glue but only 2 turned out correctly. I will probably not attempt this project again due to the results and the amount of glue that had to be used. Very disappointed!
So sorry to hear you had problems with this activity! We’ve done it several times over the years and not had any issue with it leaking but I can understand how it might happen and how disappointing it must be. 🙁
whats the durability on these type of crafts? Do they fall apart after a while?
Hi Vannessa! These crafts have held up over the years. We still pull out my daughter’s heart every year as part of our Valentine’s decorations, the original one we made is nearly 3 years old now.