DIY Marbled Valentine Magnets

My sister texted last week to say that a Valentine’s gift was on the way for Zuri and I thought, Oh crap, Valentine’s Day. Last year we made handprinted cards for family and friends but … last year wasn’t this year. (And last year I wasn’t pregnant. That’s my excuse for everything).

But, then I remembered that I picked up some polymer clay to try out with Zuri a while back and started brainstorming about what we could create with that. Behold - my last-minute idea…

Materials

• Polymer Clay

• Heart Cookie Cutters (I had some on-hand but there are great options here, here, and here). These are various sizes but for context, ours are 3.25 x 2.5”.

• Adhesive Magnets

• Rolling Pin

• Baking Sheet

• Aluminum Foil

• Circle Punch (optional)

• Small photos of your kiddo(s) (optional)

• Craft or Super glue (optional)

• Tape or Lamination (optional)

Instructions

1. Preheat oven to 250° and line a baking sheet with aluminum foil.

2. Choose 4-6 colors of clay and cut them into strips along the lines.

3. Make “sets” of colors so each heart will have a variety - this is what will create the marbling effect. (e.g. red, light pink, dark pink, purple, white)

4. Give your kiddo one "set" of color strips and let them tear them apart or cut into pieces (we love these kid-friendly knives). Let this process be imperfect, just allow them to explore.

5. Have your child arrange the tiny pieces however they want to make a relatively circular shape. Again, have fun with this! We named colors, pressed them together with our fingers, fist, the palm of hand and made new colors by mixing others.

6. Allow your child to use the rolling pin to flatten the clay. You’ll have to help here since this clay is harder than typical play-doh. Fold over some pieces and continue rolling to mix the colors and create marbling. You should end up with a piece about 1/8" thick.

7. Place the cookie cutter and have your child press down to cut. (Save the edge scraps to make more hearts at the end).

8. Repeat steps 4-7 with all the “sets” of clay colors. Combine the edge scraps and roll those out to create more hearts until you have no clay left. Any leftover scraps can also be used to make beads.

9. Bake the hearts at 250° for 20 minutes and allow them to cool completely after baking.

10. While the hearts cool, assemble the photos (if you're doing this part). We printed 1.5” circle photos on regular computer paper from a standard printer. You could get fancy here but … why…?

    The circle punch is also totally unnecessary, I just had it on-hand from my stationery days and felt like a circle photo allowed more of the marble colors to show. Completely up to you.

    I lined up the photos in the circle punch and had Zuri push my hand down to cut each one. She was thrilled seeing "so many Zuris!".

11. To keep the thin printer paper from warping or tearing on the magnet, we "laminated" them in packing tape. This is another step that's not necessary and where you could get fancy and use real lamination but who has that around the house? (Me, as a special education teacher but not anymore haha).

    Again, I let Zuri be as involved as she wanted to be. I laid out a strip of tape (sticky side up) and let her place the little circles on top. I then affixed another strip of tape on top to seal them. I quickly cut around the edges with scissors (not the circle punch).

12. Once the hearts are cool, adhere the photo to the front with craft or super glue. We had super glue in the junk drawer so I did this part, but I had Zuri hand me each circle photo and we counted out loud as we went along.

13. Lastly, adhere the circle magnets to the back of the hearts. They have adhesive already on the back so kiddos can easily peel them off the sheet and stick them on.

Voila! Handmade Valentines! You could do these with or without photos, letter a fun saying on the front with a Sharpie, add glitter or pom poms, etc. The options are endless and seriously, Zuri was into this for almost 2 hours. Solo Mama Day win!