The Valentine Box

Every year is so much fun for Valentine's Day. It was tradition when we were kids to make a valentine box for school. There were always competitions and we would try to make the best. My dad would come up with the best ideas. I am so uncreative in this area. Every year now I let Nico choose what kind of box he wants to make (pasts boxes; T-Rex and a giraffe). It is always something quite challenging. This year proved to be no different. I enjoy helping him create them, but they are always his idea, Mike and I just help with cutting shapes, etc. This year though, Nico was able to do most of it himself. Don't look ahead and see if you can figure out what he made by looking at each picture. He asked for help with the painting and holding boxes together, but that was it. Here's the start...taping a series of boxes in a certain order.
Spray painting it gray...thanks to daddy for having the gray primer spray paint, this would have taken forever to paint by hand.
Adding some fine details.
Adding even finer details....you probably guessed it by now!
And here it is in all it's glory...the Empire State Building...complete with King Kong, the girl, and the airplane. He really wanted to make the airplane fly around the top...but we didn't have all the parts to make that happen this year. Nico stands about 45"...so you can see how tall this is. I am hoping it rides carefully in the van to our Valentine Party with our homeschool friends. (We have two of them to attend).

We don't have competitions anymore, but Nico has fun creating and showing his work. He is going to be making a box for Luca to bring as well....not near as elaborate, but sure to be adorable! Pictures next week!