Kid's Valentine's Noodle Necklace DIY + Craft

It's almost Valentine's Day and we are talking a lot about love, real love.

Do you ever stop and really think about what love means to you? Do you ask your kids what love means to them? When it comes to holidays and gift giving, my family's biggest focus has always been speak about the gifts of love and openly sharing words of gratitude for one another.

One way we facilitate real love is through handmade gift giving.

Engage your children in a family fun time activity and make memories crafting these process splatter paint Valentine's noodle necklaces your kids will love to make + give. These beauties make perfect teacher gifts and lovely tokens of appreciation for any friend or family member!

Did I mention the free printable V-Day tags? Oh, yeah! (Check out the downloadable link at the bottom of this post.)

Ready to NOODLE // ALL YOU NEED IS...

acrylic paint
white distilled vinegar
Zip-lock baggies (I use the quart size)
a couple of paint brushes
squirt bottles for paint
Some twine, yarn, or your choice of stringing material
and of course – Noodles!

If you want to take advantage of the splatter set-up, pick up a card stock set and lay it out under the noodles when you get to splattering. 2-in-1 craft for some awesome L-O-V-E cards.

Let's craft!

Step 1- Place all those naked noodles in your zip-lock bags and add 4-5 drops of paint and 1 cap full of vinegar. We like to use all sorts of shapes and different textures together! These fat ones are a one of our staple noodles...

Step 2- SHAKE IT BABY!! Wow, is this my kid's very favorite part right here. Shake, shake, shake the bags until all noodles are evenly coated with paint. Excessive amounts of continued shaking after all noodles are clearly coated is totally encouraged + expected.

Step 3- Designate a "this is okay to get paint spattered on" area and put down a drop cloth and some craft or construction paper to catch all the over-splatter (pro-tip: those splattered papers make awesome boarders to mount the free printable gift tags!) Feel free to put down that card stock if you got any of that too!

Step 4- Squirt + splatter your heart out! Encourage your kids to test out lots of different methods using squirt bottles, paint brushes, toothbrushes, anything you got. See how many different processes they can come up with. Make them use those little brains + engage in fun, smart play together.

Step 5- Let your noodles lay out until they are dry to the touch and then get to stringing. Simple as that! Your beautiful noodles are perfect for necklaces, bracelets, key chains, you name it. If you have itty bitty littles, hand-over-hand fine motor skill activities like stringing beads are awesome brain stimulation + it's fun for older sibs to get to help teach/ coach their baby brothers and sisters through activities.

Noodle for thought:

As beautiful as all our noodle creations always turn out, the best part about them isn't the final product: we craft for the process not the product. Crafts and activities are engagement tools that bring us closer to our children and feed their fundamental need for our gaze, our face, our dedicated interaction.

Have fun, engage + love well as a family. That's the point of all this, right?

Look up, Mama.

look-up-challenge-7-days-to-deeper-connections-parenting-tips-support

If you are looking for a way to really facilitate all the L-O-V-E your child needs from you... join dozens of other caregivers in the #LookUpChallenge and learn tips + tricks on how to love better in the age of technology + cell phones.