Markers & Preschoolers do not mix

It's coming up on Valentine's day.. I was so proud of myself when I found this jumbo box of heart shaped fruit snacks with cute little "To" & "From" on them.. Woohoo! Cards & snack in one for all the little kids. Bonus that the jumbo box had enough to cover all three kids classes & at a price much cheaper than buying each their own box of normal valentines.

Naturally each teacher wanted the kids to do their valentines differently :

Southern Darlin' (kindergarten) is expected to write her own name Plus all her classmates names by herself.. Yeah they might be ready by NEXT Vday.

Spoiled Princess (4yr old preschool) is only to write her own name, by herself. Strict instructions NOT to address them to specific classmates to make distribution easier.

Drool Prince (3yr old preschool) is to have his name and classmates' names on the cards but his teacher doesn't care if the child or the parents fill them out.  Thank you 3yr old teacher!

I had planned on getting started on the valentines over the weekend- knowing full well it's going to take quite a while for Southern Darlin' to get done since she has the attention span of a gnat.  But I did what I do when I dont want to do something.. I procrastinated..

So here it is Monday & I decided I'd whip myself into shape and get the preschooler's together to get theirs done so all I have left is to get Southern Darlin' to do hers later..

I pulled out the fruit snack valentines and tried to write.. didn't work. Tried another pen, Still didn't work.  Then I read closely : Use Permanent Marker.   Uhmm excuse me? A permanent marker in the hands of a 3 & 4yr old? You have GOT to be kidding??

Spoiled Princess did hers with a little help.. Quite a few are smeared b/c she's still mastering holding a marker correctly let alone keeping her hand out of it after she writes.. Added to that is the fact that she can't decide if she's a righty or lefty & feels it's perfectly fine to just write half her 5letter name on one line & then go to the next to write the rest.. lol..  Oh and she kept calling her A's balloons.. Wasn't til I looked closely to see what she meant.. she's making an "a"  like this ::

O

|

|

So yeah it doesn't kinda look like a balloon or part of a hangman game.

Thankfully Cowie bought some cute dinosaur cards for Drool Prince to hand out, so I filled out his snack ones & proceeded to let him attempt his dino ones.. Although those also seemed to be made of shiny type material which does not like pens very well. 

I have NO clue why I didn't recognize this possible problem when I bought the fruit snack.. I suppose I was so smug about the price savings that I didn't think it thru logically.  There is no way Southern Darlin' will fit her name on the fruit snack, let alone in permanent marker.. I'm thinking of having her write it on regular paper & taping it on cuz I'm classy like that.