DIY Heart Book

I’m loving Making Books with Kids: 25 Paper Projects to Fold, Sew, Paste, Pop, and Draw by Esther K. Smith with illustrations by Jane Sanders and typo-o-graphics by Dikko Faust which will be published 2/1/16. I adapted one of the book’s projects to make a found-object heart book for kids for Valentine’s Day or any day.

Kids: use this book for poems, drawings, stories, or memories!

To make it 100% recycled art, be sure to use recycled papers.

DIY Heart Book

1. Trace a heart onto cardboard. (Print out a heart template here.) I used the back of a cereal box. Add a connecting rectangle to the side of the heart. Flip and draw the heart again so you have two hearts connected by a rectangle.

2. Use this cardboard template to cut out the pages for your book. Keep the two hearts and rectangle. You’ll have to do this diagonally to fit on a piece of paper.

3. Cut out as many pages as you want for your book. I used one of these pages to cover the interior of the cardboard piece.

4. Gather small objects from your junk drawer, toy box, or office supplies. Glue on to the cover side of your cardboard piece, the right-sided heart. We used the low-temp hot glue gun to adhere oddly shaped objects.

5. Paint or spray paint your cover front and back. We used gold.

6. Fold the book and papers. Hole punch the side binding. Thread a ribbon through the holes and tie in the back snuggly against the book and also to make a handle loop.