I ran across this idea somewhere and LOVED the idea! I started the tradition with the door hearts in 2011 when my girls were just 4 and 2 years old.
All you need is some construction paper, a heart stencil, a marker, scissors and scotch tape. I picked a different color heart for each child. So my oldest got red, and my youngest got pink. I even made a set for my husband that was light blue. When my son came along in 2013, I made his green. The hallway gets very colorful during February!
After you cut your 28 (or 29) hearts out, I labeled them with the numbers for the days of the month. The first year I just took one blank heart each morning and wrote something I loved about that child or my husband. I then taped it to their door under a little sign I made that said “I LOVE…”. Each heart finished the sentence. Some examples of what I have written are in the picture below. As the month went on, I had to get more and more creative and really dig deep on what I loved about each family member. It made me watch them throughout the day and really focus on their positive characteristics and what they did that made me smile. I LOVE this time of year for this tradition!
This is what their doors looked like once February 28th (or 29th) hit! Covered with LOVE! I would find them outside their door reading them over and over with a smile on their face.
My daughter and son share a room, so the different color hearts really helped since they shared a door.
This is such a great tradition to help you focus on the love you have for the family around you. I especially LOVE writing down the things I love about my husband. I am pretty sure I saw him sneak a peek when I was not looking. He is not the romantic type, but having someone tell you all the things they love about you feels pretty good.
After the first year, I decided to laminate the hearts. I then have the option to use the things I loved about them the past years or I can write a new one on the back in dry erase marker. Our children are constantly changing and growing, so it is nice to have a blank space on the back of each heart to write new things we love about them but always have the first year remembered with being laminated forever.
To stressing less and playing more,
Melissa 🙂
Leave a Reply