Tapestry of Faith: Love Surrounds Us: A Program on the UU Principles and Beloved Community for Grades K-1

Faith In Action: Love Notes

Activity time: 20 minutes

Materials for Activity

  • A clothesline and clothes pins
  • Construction paper in a variety of colors
  • Color markers
  • Heart stickers
  • Envelopes

Preparation for Activity

  • Cut construction paper into 6x8-inch pieces.
  • Hang the clothesline in a place where all can see and reach it.
  • Optional: Lightly sketch the word "love" on some pieces of construction paper, for younger children to trace over in marker.

Description of Activity

Participants identify feelings associated with giving and receiving words of love.

Help participants write "love" and their names on as many pieces of construction paper as they wish. Younger children can trace the word and write their own interpretation of their name. Encourage them to decorate the notes with stickers. Help children hang the love notes along the clothesline with clothes pins.

Invite children to think about people they see in their daily lives who need love. Engage them to think and talk about this as they make love notes. Help children see both people they know and people they do not know as possible recipients of love.

Invite participants to look, in the weeks to come, for people who need a little love. Give each participant several love notes to take home in an envelope to deliver to people in their community. Invite the minister, or a lay visitation person, to take Love Notes off the clothesline to give to people who receive pastoral care, so they will have a physical note to hold with a participant's message of love.

Next time the group meets, be sure to follow up with participants about how they felt when passing out love notes. Ask if participants received love notes, and how that felt. Talk about the good feelings brought about by both sending and receiving written messages of love.