Valentine's Day

We had a pretty fun day on Valentine's Day.  I had a festive breakfast planned, but Cat beat me to the punch!  Before I was up for the day, she brought me breakfast she made all by herself: grits, bacon, a fried egg, apple juice, and hot chocolate.  With a cute little note.  Is she not the best kid ever??  I found out later that she'd planned it out with Ben, but Ben had taken over a certain child's bed early in the morning when said child took up residence in our bed.  So Cat couldn't find Ben when it was time to make breakfast and, assuming he'd gone to the gym, did it all herself.

I didn't do as much decorating or gift-giving as I have in the past, but put out a few little things for everyone.  The fun part was rice krispie treats "Hershey's Kisses" I made, complete with little labels for everyone.

And the kids enjoyed reading the love notes they'd collected in their envelopes.  We made these envelopes two Mondays before Valentine's Day for an FHE, and talked about using kind words with each other.  We added love notes to the envelopes here and there leading up to Valentine's Day.

Each child had a coupon for a day out in his/her envelope.  Ben took the boys for a Man Day - seeing the fish at Cabela's and getting a hot dog at JDawg's.  I took the girls for a Girls Day - getting haircuts, eating lunch at the food court in the mall, then getting makeovers at the Clinique counter at Macy's.  Obviously I need to practice my selfie skills because the below picture doesn't do justice to our haircuts or makeovers (except perhaps the RED lipstick Eliza chose).  Cat chose very subtle colors, and said she felt a bit self-conscious getting her makeup done in a public place.  We talked about how Eliza has more of a dramatic style and Cat is more subdued.  Eliza couldn't understand why Cat and I weren't wearing more showy makeup.  She has said over and over again that she wants to go back and get another makeover.

When we got home from our outings, we put together our customary fondue dinner.  Every year Ben and I talk about doing traditional fondue, cooking our meat and vegetables in oil, but we always chicken out.  Hopefully our kids will be able to handle that in a few years.  So once again, we stuck with our tried and true Alfredo dipping sauce with bread, pasta, chicken, and broccoli.  We added roasted asparagus this year and that was delicious.  Then it was chocolate fondue for dessert with strawberries, marshmallows, and graham crackers.  We did some dancing after dinner, but Ben (who'd been fighting a cold) was done by then and it wasn't as fun without him.  We'll have to have another dance party when everyone feels better.

All in all, it was a fun day.

We just had one setback - Luke broke a music box that I've had for 15-20 years.  It was a cool wizard with signs of the Zodiac etched on the glass globe, and played "Music of the Night." My parents gave it to me when I was a teenager, when I had a small collection of music boxes, and I really loved it.  Cat had been keeping it in her room and liked to play the music before she went to sleep.  Luke found it on her shelf and toddled all the way upstairs with it, just to drop it on the tile at the top of the stairs.  We mourned briefly, but we moved on.  By now we've just accepted that this is part of life with Luke.  And we love him more than music boxes.