Valentine’s Day Themed Activities For Preschoolers

Valentine’s Day falls on February 14th every year. It’s a day to celebrate love. Nowadays, it’s a fantastic opportunity for parents and carers to create lots of themed activities around Valentine’s Day. Hearts and pink and red play a massive part. I have compiled a list of ideas, some tried-and-tested, to try with your little ones this February.

1. Valentine’s Dot Marker Books

I had never heard of Dot Markers until 2022. But now I love them! They come in all different colours and there are specific dot marker books out there for Valentine’s.

2. Sticky Hearts

Using contact paper and pink card, create a sticky heart. Then, use tissue paper – purples, reds and pinks, plus any sparkly bits you have and pink pom-poms. Let your little one rip the tissue paper, screw it up, cut it with child-safe scissors or twist it and then stick it onto the contact paper. My 17-month-old loved this activity (though her 18-month-old cousin showed zero interest! Haha!). It’s great fine-motor practice too! When my almost 4-year-old saw what we’d made, she wanted to have a go too.

The offcuts for the hearts also make another great activity which you’ll find next.

Check out my other Valentine’s post with other activity ideas here.

3. Valentine’s Stickers

Use the heart from the middle of the pink card from above and get your little one to decorate it using heart stickers. They may or may not need help getting the stickers off the sheet but it’s a lot of fun to stick them where they like. Then, add some lovely felt pen squiggles and you have the perfect Valentine’s heart for a decoration or gift. Playing with stickers is great fine motor practice using those fingers.

4. Sensory Tray

My two daughters (17 months and nearly 4 at the time of writing) love my sensory trays. This one uses dyed rice, pink and purple pom-poms, pipe cleaners, silicone cake cases, heart cookie cutters and scoops. They just love making a mess with it…as well as pouring, scooping, making cakes, drawing with the pipe cleaners, feeling the rice between their fingers. It’s such a great sensory activity.

I used pink food gel to dye the uncooked rice. I put rice into a plastic food bag with a small amount of dye and smooshed it around until all the rice was covered. Then, I rinsed it in some white vinegar. Apparently this helps to keep the colour on. Then, I left the rice out on baking paper on a baking tray overnight for it to dry. We can re-use this rice over and over.

5. Paint Stamping with Sponges

Find some sponge and cut it into heart shapes. Around Valentine’s, you may find heart-shaped make-up sponges being sold in the shops, so grab some of those to make life easier.

6. Paint Stamping with Cookie Cutters

Mix up some reds and pink paint and dip your cookie cutters in and put them on your piece of paper or card. And repeat. I used a plastic cookie cutter but you can use metal too.

7. Watercolour Painted Hearts

Get some watercolour paper and draw hearts on by drawing round a cookie cutter. Then, get your little one to paint away to their heart’s content with the watercolours. My nearly 4-year-old did a few hearts at a time and would keep coming back to them day after day. When they’d dried and I’d cut them out for her (though you could get them to practise their cutting skills by giving this a try), she then enjoyed giving them out to friends and family.

8. Read “Love” Themed Books

We raided our local library last week for any books with hearts or about love in the baby and children sections. I had also reserved some from their catalogue so we have quite a few “love” books at home at the moment. They’re just so cute!

Our favourite has to be, “A Kiss For You” by Patricia Hegarty. The animals’ arms pop out from the page and it looks like they are hugging their parents. It’s so sweet!