happy valentine's day!

I hope you had a festive Valentine's Day. I thought this baby would be here by now, so I didn't want to go overboard with Valentine's plans. But since it isn't here yet, I was able to pull off a few festive things since it was my turn to plan Valentine's Day this year. (By the way, I love that we take turns planning Valentine's Day and our Anniversary every year. It takes out all the guessing of how much to do.) Anyways, I came across these festive heart cinnamon rolls on Pinterest. Are you on Pinterest? If so, we should be friends.

These heart cinnamon rolls were super easy. I used my favorite dough recipe and filled it like normal. Instead of starting from one end and making one giant roll, I rolled each side to the middle. Does that make sense? That way, you are forming the top of the heart. Then, after you cut each piece, you pinch the bottom to form the bottom part of the heart like this:

Here they are after they baked. They don't look quite as cute, but you can still tell they are hearts.

I'm definitely going to be making these again next year or for an anniversary. They were a hit! Hope you had a fun Valentine's Day!

heart day decor!

My sister lives in NYC. She has very little space to store decorations which always presents

a big problem as she tries to come up with festive ways to spruce up her apartment for holidays.

For Valentine's Day this year, she made these simple and small decorations. Cute, huh? 

She was even kind enough to send me some heart garland for my mantle. 

She got the instructions here and here.  

If you still need something quick for V-day, these would be a great!

Heart Molasses Crinkles

Today is...Umbrella Day.
Put on your rain boots and use an umbrella!

And...

My husband LOVES molasses cookies. I don't. 

But I try to make them at least once a year for him. 

I made him some for Valentine's day and cut them into heart shapes after they baked.

I use this recipe:

Molasses Crinkles

3/4 c. soft margarine
1 egg
1/4 c molasses
1 c.  brown sugar
2 1/4 c. flour
1 tsp cinnamon
1 tsp ginger
1 tsp cloves
1/4 tsp salt
2 tsp soda

Directions:
Cream margarine, egg, molasses, and brown sugar together. Sift together all the dry ingredients and then add to the egg mixture. Chill dough. Roll in 1" balls. Dip in sugar and place on greased cookie sheet. bake at 375 for 8-10 minutes.

valentine's BINGO

A fun game for all ages to play at your Valentine's party: BINGO!

It is always a hit.

Download your own BINGO cards here.

valentine's for the guys

For all those men out there who are in love with anything hot...

this is a Valentine's idea for them.

(can also use with Red Hots, Hot Tamales, Spicy Cheetos...)

love magnets

Give your love an early Valentine's gift. 

Each day leading up to Valentine's, leave a message on the fridge by making these magnets. 

Simple print off romantic words and mix them up for some creative love notes!

Or, for a simpler solution, use a dry erase marker on the bathroom mirror.

12 days of valentines ideas

I came across the 12 days of Valentine's Idea last year, but never got around to doing it. Since I just did the 12 days of Christmas, I think I'll hold off for another year yet again, but I thought it was cute! Tweak it to make it more personalized. 

Day 1 - one balloon that says "I Love You"
Day 2 - two coupons for various special favors or treats
Day 3 - three love songs, some taped and some written words, that mean something special to you
Day 4 - four love poems, handwritten
Day 5 - five terms of endearment
Day 6 - six chocolate candy hearts
Day 7 - seven flowers
Day 8 - eight heart shaped cookies
Day 9 - nine message heart candies
Day 10 - ten reasons (of the millions) why I love him
Day 11 - eleven Hershey's hugs and kisses
Day 12- (Valentine's) - twelve ways to say "I Love You"

Valetine's Day mantle

Happy Valentine's Day!
xoxo

If you don't have time

to make a Valentine's dessert, make this super easy festive treat. Directions and photo credit here

Thanks Emily for sending it in!

Heart S'mores

My friend had a great idea to make homemade graham crackers. They are a little time consuming to make, but are delicious! Since it was the month of love, we decided to shape them into hearts like this:

 We then melted down some kisses and molded them into a heart shaped pan. We added in a marshmallow, broiled for 30 seconds and had ourselves some "hearty" s'mores.

Love gift idea #2

{heart massagers}

valentine's day ideas recap

since many of you were not around last year for valentine's day, i decided to highlight some of my favorite posts. many of these ideas came from you! don't ever be afraid to send in your festive ideas!

valentine's dinner from andrea

heart notes

poster board valentines from emily

kiss cookies

want more ideas? click on the valentine's day tag on the sidebar -->

Love gift idea

{heart measuring spoons}

Heart garland

I have been loving all types of garland right lately. In fact, so much so that I made 2 for V-Day. My friend Marcelle was nice enough to make this super simple heart garland with me. We were inspired by Martha Stewart's garland here. Get detailed instructions here:

All you need is:

• wax paper
• old crayons
• iron

It makes our bedroom a little more festive!

Red burlap wreath

My friend and I were inspired by Whipperberry's Red Burlap Wreath and decided to make our own to festify our houses for the month of love.

I won't share all the details since you can get them all here, but here is the finished product. The best part is: you can make it well under $10.

V-day gift for those who didn't win...

I'm in love with this Valentine decor.
I love the clean, simple, modern look to it.
And guess what?

You can get your own print for FREE!
Visit this site and leave a comment.
It's that easy.

Pistachio heart wreath

I had some leftover pistachios from Christmas.
I wanted a Valentine's Day wreath.

So I took those pistachios and made a wreath out of them!

I cut a heart out of cardboard.
Then, I hot glued the pistachios on.
Then, I spray painted it all red.
Easy as that.

And so very festive!

F.O.A.D.: 5 things to do with a glass jar

This inaugural "Festify on a dime" post will hopefully give you a better idea of what this whole series is about. It's all about being able to festive without a lot of expense.

Since there aren't many exciting things happening in January, this week's posts will fall under the theme of

5 things to do with a glass jar

And just if you don't think there are five festive things to do with a glass jar, well, you just wait and I'll prove it.

#1 Love Jar

When my husband’s parents were moving, they were throwing out this large glass jar. I knew I wanted it when I saw it. I’ve come up with quite a few ideas for it, which explains why it always moving around our house.


But this time of year, it will be debuting as our Love Note Jar. I tied a few ribbons (saved from gifts) around it to look festive for Valentine's Day. I also cut a few small squares of red, pink, and white paper.

Until Valentine's Day, my husband and I can write little love notes to each other. We'll plop them in the jar and then on Valentine's Day, we'll get to read them all as part of our festivities.

Mini Kiss Cookies

Who doesn't love kisses at Valentines?

We have a recipe in my family that we call Kiss Cookies. They are SO scrumptious and are always the first to go at any family party or gathering. The only problem is, I hardly ever have Hershey Kisses on hand.

Well, I think I may have just come up with a solution. They are still just as tasty, a bit more cost-effective, and so dang cute--MINI KISS COOKIES.

What you will need: flour, salt, baking soda, margarine, peanut butter, 1 egg, vanilla, brown sugar, white sugar, and chocolate chips (Complete recipe is at the end of this post)

Stir 1 3/4 cup flour, 1 tsp. baking soda, and 1/2 tsp. salt together and set aside.

Cream 1/2 cup margarine and 1/2 cup peanut butter together.

Then gradually add 1/2 cup white sugar and 1/2 cup brown sugar. When all of that is well blended, add the egg and 1/2 tsp vanilla.
Then add flour mixture.

Roll into balls. For mini cookies, use 1/4 tsp. of dough for each ball.

Then roll each ball of dough into sugar.

And place on cookie sheet. Bake at 375 for 5-7 minutes, depending on how soft you like your cookies.

As soon as you take the cookies out of the oven, take a chocolate chip and place it in the middle of the cookie.

Let the cookies cool and you have yourself mini Kiss Cookies. Of course, you can make regular ones with Kisses.

Serve them on a platter or wrap them up for a Valentine's gift.

Kiss Cookies
1 3/4 c. flour
1 tsp. baking soda
1/2 tsp. salt
1/2 c. margarine
1 egg
1/2 cup sugar
1 tsp. vanilla
1/2 c. brown sugar
1/2 c. peanut butter
sugar (to roll the balls in before you bake)

Stir together flour, baking soda, and salt and set aside. Cream margarine, peanut butter until well mixed. Gradually add sugars, mixing until creamy and well blended. Beat in the egg and vanilla. Then add flour mixture. Roll dough into balls and dip in sugar. Bake at 375 for 5 minutes for mini cookies or 7-9 for larger cookies. Remove from the oven and quickly press chocolate kiss (or chocolate chip) on top of each cookie.

Valentine's Dinner

It's Andrea again with another fun Valentine's tradition. For dinner on Valentine's day we have a totally Pink/Red Dinner. You can make food that's already red or pink or get creative and dye your food to make it festive. Here's a few pictures of our Valentine's Dinner...

We dressed up the table with some simple scrapbook paper placemats and some red plates we have.

I grabbed some things around the house to dress up the table.

We added some red food coloring to the biscuit dough and threw a Valentine's towel under them to make them extra festive.

We kept it simple with some naturally red foods - spaghetti and pink lemonade.

Some delicious red jello topped with a little whipped cream.

One perfectly festive Valentine's Dinner!