The delightful blogger community Guest Post series carries on with an adorable little Heart Animal Craft for Valentine’s Day! Today, we’re presenting this charming and simple-to-create Lion Heart Craft! Valentine’s Day Crafts are a favorite here at Red Ted Art.. and this tiny paper heart project is absolutely precious.
What makes this heart project so useful is that it can be adjusted for various age levels – with younger children, you can handle cutting the tiny hearts while allowing them to practice cutting the large heart for the lion’s head. This is an excellent way to build fine motor coordination and scissor skills.
Older children may cut every shape on their own. You can also invite them to transform this heart lion project into a Valentine’s Day Card (fold the orange paper and line the base heart up with the folded edge, so you create two hearts joined along the side). Then, have some fun adding Lion Puns inside the card (see below for a few Lion Valentine’s Day Puns).
Meet our Guest Writer – Claire from Childhood Magic
Hello! I’m Claire from Childhood Magic. I enjoy creating crafts and special memories with my children, and I hope to encourage you to do so as well! Childhood Magic is filled with activities, projects, recipes, and free printables designed to make your job a little simpler and help you reach the best part; building lasting memories and discovering things together. I’m a huge admirer of Red Ted Art and am delighted to share this project with you!
Heart-Shaped Lion Face- Valentine’s Day Craft
Kids can enjoy Valentine’s Day with this entertaining heart-shaped lion face! Creating animals from hearts is an imaginative way to explore shapes, and decorating them is especially enjoyable. This project was inspired by one of my favorite children’s Valentine’s books- ‘My Heart is like a Zoo,’. It’s a rhyming tale featuring animals, with illustrations showing every animal built from heart shapes! Reading it while making this craft would be lots of fun.
For this project, I used my free printable heart template collection, which made everything much simpler. The set includes multiple heart sizes as a complimentary download. They can also be used as coloring sheets.
What does a heart-shaped craft involve?
This is an extremely easy activity that children of nearly any age can take part in. Essentially, one shape is used to create something else, which in this example is a lovable lion! Preschool children can assist with gluing and decorating, while older kids may be able to complete the project independently. It’s ideal for practicing scissor control, identifying shapes, and understanding how different shapes fit together.
Why children enjoy creating animal crafts/ lion hearts
- Animals are enjoyable to create, and children can practice their sounds, appearances, and the many fun Valentine’s Day puns connected with each shape!
- They can also serve as cards for friends or relatives- simply include a ‘LION’ pun and they’re sure to enjoy it!
A few Lion Puns for you:
Here are several adorable lion puns to include in your cards
- “I’m not LION, you’re an awesome friend” is a quick and simple choice! (Naturally, you can include any message, such as “you’re adorable” or “I love you” and so on)
- I am WILD about you!
- To my MANE guy.
- Dad, you’re the Mane Man!
- You’re ext-ROAR-dinary
- You are ROAR-some!
Materials required for your Lion Heart Craft
- Cardstock or paper – I chose orange, yellow, pink, and red, though you can personalize your lion in any way you like!
- Simple school glue- a glue stick works as well
- Markers
- Heart template (this can be downloaded for free from the Childhood Magic blog!)
To download this lovely free Lion Heart Craft template, head over to Childhood Magic and follow the directions provided there. Feel free to send me a message if you run into any difficulties!
How to Make it/Tips
- First, print your template and cut out the heart shapes. You can design your lion however you wish, but to recreate mine, you’ll need one large heart, one medium heart, and 3 small hearts. You may also prepare additional tiny hearts for the inner ears, or simply color those areas if you prefer.
Flip the medium heart upside down, then glue it onto the large heart to form the lion’s face.
Create the ears and nose by attaching the small pink hearts to the large orange heart with glue.
With a marker, draw the eyes, mouth, and any additional features you want, such as whiskers.
To make a card, glue an extra piece of cardstock onto the back. Alternatively, write your pun on the back of the lion!
Searching for additional Valentine’s Day inspiration? Here are some of my top picks! Don’t forget to visit us on Pinterest for even more creative ideas and inspiration!
A huge thank you to Claire from Childhood Magic! Don’t forget to stop by Claire’s website for a lovely look around too. We hope you enjoyed this wonderfully cute little Lion Heart Craft as much as we did!It truly is the PERFECT project to pair with the My Heart is like a Zoo book this Valentine’s Day. So charming. Why not pick up a copy of the book and discover which other heart-shaped animal crafts you can try?
These Lion Hearts would be wonderful heart cards (Cut the base lion along an edge to create a card that opens). Here are some more fantastic Valentine’s Cards for Preschoolers and Valentines Card for kids to inspire you during this Valentine’s Day Season:
