All the way back in the 14th century, Chaucer wrote a little poems called The Parliament of Fowls (Parlement of Foules), in which he describes the day as being one where birds found love and their mates. Before his poem, there had been no connection between Valentine’s Day and romance. These little love birds of his started a whole new holiday!

Since we are bird nerds over here, we decided to do a little something to honor this idea of birds and Valentine’s Day, just for a little fun, and decided to make bird feeders in the shape of hearts, an idea I got from Wyatt’s teacher. This was a super fun and super cute little craft, with very little mess, something I am not used to. We usually tend to make messy crafts around here, with paint or glue everywhere. So this was a nice change! Lol.

It’s very simple as you can see, using only yarn, pipe cleaners, and Cheerios!

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Then we simply bent the pipe cleaners in a sort of heart shape to start with, strung on the Cheerios (which was great OT for Wyatt – fine motor and bilateral use of both hands!!), closed the heart off, and added the yarn! Voila. Then we took them outside and hung them in our apple tree. I hung them on itty bitty branches, hoping that squirrels and Pippin my possum friend don’t try to eat them. I am afraid that they would try to eat the pipe cleaner too. I am also keeping a close eye on them too, just in case.

We finished up by reading In the Snow by Sharon Phillps Denslow, which was a super cute read about a little boy who leaves birdseed out for his feathered and furry friends. It’s a simple little book that talks about the backyard birds and animals that might visit your feeders in winter. And it reminded me that we actually are out of birdseed, so I need to put it on our shopping list!

If you are interested in other Valentine’s Day nature crafts, I found so many cute and creative ideas around the internet!

Heart Leaf Lanterns (I am hoping to squeeze this one before Valentine’s Day!) from Rhythms of Play

Twig Centerpiece from Crafting a Green World

Pine Cone Love Bugs from Fireflies and Mudpies

Heart Shaped Homemade Bird Seed Feeders from Jen Loves Kev

These are just a few of the many I found! My Pinterest got a serious workout this week with all of my pinning.

We have a long winter break weekend, five days off for kiddo, ahead of us, I would love to hear about any craft or activities that you might do!