Be Mine... + A Minted Giveaway

Previous years' hand-painted(!) valentines...


And this years' model from Minted...

I'm a fan of a good homemade valentine. They're sweet and special, but sometimes they're not, well...realistic. Like say, when you're about to start a new job and have a "to do" list a mile long that you'd like to accomplish before said job begins. Or when (hypothetically of course) one of your daughters goes to a really cool elementary school where they combine the 1st and 2nd grade classes, necessitating you to create 50(!!!) valentines for her to hand out (not counting the additional 15 that you need to make for your younger daughter's class). Or, when the homemade valentines that your girlies insist on making take something like 9.5 minutes per card (not that I'm counting), which when multiplied by 65 equals a looong freakin' time to make homemade valentines. Just sayin'.

So we're going a different route this year...somewhere between bought and homemade, "homemade light" if you will. I met up with the lovely folks from Minted at Alt last month and was smitten with all their cute classmate valentines, which, upon returning, I immediately pulled up on the old interwebs to show the girlies. They were (surprisingly) 100% on board. No whining. (Frankly I think they too were daunted by the 617 minutes of homemade valentine crafting that they'd signed themselves up for...)

I let them each select a card with no input from me (well, sort of...you know of my control freak tendencies), and we picked out a photo of each of them to use as a backer to make them more personal. We're planning to write a little note on each one and attach a sucker with a bit of Japanese washi tape. Done and done.

I figured I might not be the only one in the "homemade valentine dread" boat, so we're going to do a super quick Minted giveaway (to give you plenty of time to order those valentines before heart day arrives).

Just leave a comment on this post by midnight CT tonight(!!) and I'll announce a winner of a $50 Minted credit tomorrow.

Good luck!