Sweet and Simple Ways to Show Your Kids You Care this Valentine’s Day
Wouldn’t it be great if Valentine’s Day was just about a day of showing love and kindness for everyone in our lives—from friends to children, siblings to spouses—and less about over-the-top Valentine gifts? To get back to the real message of love, we reached out to our crew of savvy writers and asked them to share all the ways they make their kids feel special, loved, and appreciated on Valentine’s Day.
Here are their answers.
Love & Pizza
‘Tradition for my husband and I has always been to make dinner at home and watch a movie. Our girls are now part of that. Often my oldest requests a heart-shaped homemade pizza.’
-Tamara Goyette
Red Everything
‘If I’m super-organized and it’s a school day, I’ll do a red-themed Bento lunch for them.’
-Louise Gleeson
You Get a Chocolate and You Get a Chocolate… Everyone Gets a Chocolate!
‘I buy chocolate for everyone and we order a Valentine’s Day family dinner from a local shop. We set the table all fancy and eat together, the four of us. The shop is great because for each adult order we place, they include a kids’ meal.’
-Rebecca Stanisic
You Had Me at Fondue
‘Heart-shaped mini pizzas, chocolates waiting at their spot in the morning, making tissue flowers, and a dinner of cheese and also chocolate fondue for the whole family.’
-Janice Quirt
Special Valentines
‘I’m thinking of starting a new tradition of having the kids create five Valentines to give away to people of their choice who work at the school outside of their class. Just to acknowledge our custodians, administrators etc.’
-Robyn Burnett
Forever Hearts
‘I make heart-shaped everything. Heart-shaped egg in a hole or pancakes. Heart shaped sandwiches. We go around the table at dinner and tell each other what our favourite thing about each other is.’
-Leslie Kennedy
For the Love of Books
‘I always buy my kids a new book that I leave on their breakfast plate, and we have a heart-shaped chocolate cake for dessert in the evening.’
-Jan Scott
It’s All About Connection
‘Similar to Thanksgiving we go round the table and tell each other what we love about each other—siblings included. While it’s a Hallmark manufactured holiday it’s a good excuse to remind each other of our connection.’
-Deanna Regan
Little Kids Are Easy to Impress
‘I buy my kids individual and elaborate greeting cards (the ones with felt hearts or fuzzy animals on them, for example) because my kids are pretty young and seem to love those types of things still. Then I put them at their place at the breakfast table so they’ll see it when they wake up, along with a small chocolate. Small but sweet! Little kids are pretty easy to impress!’
-Heather Dixon
