In the U.S. there is a long tradition of exchanging gifts and flowers on Valentine‘s Day, but the Valentine Card didn’t really catch on until the Mid-Nineteenth Century. Around 1850, Esther Howland began to produce elaborate, romantic Valentine Cards incorporating paper lace and embossed floral die cuts into her designs.

Although commercial cards were already available in the U.S., Howland’s colorful cards managed capture the beauty and romance that epitomized the Victorian era. Her cards were quickly embraced by the public and soon she found she could hardly keep up with the demand.

Valentine Cards continue to outsell cards for every other holiday except Christmas and children especially love to give and receive Valentine Cards and candy.

If your child requires cards for his or her entire class or just a few for family and friends, you don’t have to rush out and buy boxes of cards. Instead you can save time and money by printing your own cards from one of the following websites.

DLTK's Holiday Activities for Kids has thirteen card themes to choose from including Hello Kitty, Blue’s Clues, Sponge Bob, and Powder Puff Girls. Cards are in gif format, load quickly and can be printed in Color or Black & White. Many print in multiples of 4 to a page.

If your kids want to personalize their Valentines, then Kaboose offers a selection of printable cards to color. Also offered in the middle of the page are several sheets of small, colorful Valentines that print eight to a page. The mini cards are really mini-cards. I used print preview and enlarged the cards to 175% and they fit the page just right.

Kids Turn Central offers three different pages of Valentines. These simple, but colorful cards print 4 to a page. Kid simply need print and cut the cards a part.

Activity Village offers sweet, simple, pastel colored cards that kids will love to give or to get.

If your kids want to make their Valentines extra special then Mars has a couple really sweet card projects for your kids to print and hand out for Valentine’s Day.

The Dove Card, as in Dove chocolates, requires a bag of dove milk chocolate hearts to complete the cards. The cards print out with 2 spots inside the card to attach the chocolates.

The M&M Card has a place on the front to attach a fun size bag of M&M candies. It’s a nice way to include something extra in your Valentine wishes.

Family Fun Magazine offers colorful printable Valentine cards for classroom giving.

Print Free always has a nice selection of printable cards.

Makingfriends.com offers four Valentine's Cards on a single page.

If you need an envelope for your Valentines, Family Fun has a printable template for a small valentine’s envelope. Simply print out the pattern, trim and fold.

The envelope has a cute heart closure and the M&M and Dove Cards will fit this envelope perfectly with just a little trimming off the bottom edge of the cards. The Kid’s Turn Central and Kids Domain mini cards will also fit this envelope.