Make Handmade Valentines from Trash at Home

Why spend money when you don’t have to?  That seems to be our motto around here these days, and Valentine’s Day is no exception.  Here are a couple of Valentines we put together with bits and pieces that were otherwise destined for the trash.  Don’t you just love a bit of repurposing?

The first Valentines we made were just little notes like the ones we all used to exchange in elementary school.  Instead of buying cards, we cut up a cornflakes box.  The text came from an old Business Week I’d been hoarding from Christmas… well except the word “love”, obviously.  That word didn’t seem to come up in my magazine.  A couple markers, stamps, and colored pencils later, and here’s what we got:

school-valentine
Next, we had an old gift bag.  (By “we”, you can probably guess that it was more “I” with Martin occasionally entering the scene to sign his name before we popped the cards in envelopes.)  So we pulled out the cardboard insert and drew a quick, crooked design.  We poked little holes along the drawing with a needle, and sewed from hole to hole until this:
key-to-my-heart-11
became this:
key to my heart 2
Then to wrap things up, we used a heart-shaped hole punch and started attacking some junk mail.  We cut the header off some old letterhead paper Martin’s family had, glued the hearts on it, and made a few cards.  Too easy!
heart card
The possibilities for handmade valentines are endless when you stop thinking about the things in your house as trash and start looking at them as building blocks for handmade projects.  Plus it’s so much more fun than grabbing a quick card at the store sometimes.
What could you make with the things in your house?  We’d love to hear about the valentines you’re giving.
(images by Katie for Making This Home)