I love Love Day!

I really like holidays. Like...a Lot! If there is a day I can celebrate and make more fun with colored food or decorations, I am in. So Valentine's Day is right up there with favorite days.

We started the celebration by sending these "hugs" to relatives not close enough to get a hug from Shortstop.

He loved playing in the paint and then of course I measured his arm length in ribbon so it was an exact hug. :) Kids are great for making cheesy stuff like this!

Mark and I decided not to do gifts or flowers this year and just go on a nice date and focus on making the day fun for Shortstop. Note to self: I actually do like gifts and flowers so while this was a nice test run, next year will involve money being spent on something cheesy, pointless and over priced. :)

Of course we had the mandatory champagne-glass-filled-with-non-alcoholic-beverage toast to how great we are. And to world peace, obviously.

My mom sent me this beautiful book about being a mom and let's just say I bawled through the whole thing. If you want to feel wonderful about being a woman or a mom, just borrow this from me and it will lift your spirits.

I woke up to this heart on the TV. This was made of love notes that Mark has given me over the years. I saved every one so he decided to repurpose them and make this. Sweetest husband ever? I should say so!

There are a few lovey dovey traditions we have that are not just for Valentine's but that I love doing. One is this frame in our kitchen.

It is a simple frame with lined scrapbook paper in it and we write notes to each other with dry erase markers. I love seeing notes from Mark after he leaves for work. The other is that little white coin thing in the corner. It is called SHMILY. We hide it in different places for the other to find. Some places have been the egg carton, in a pair of socks, in a book we are reading, in the printer and so on and so forth. It stands for See How Much I Love You. I love finding it in the most random places because it always makes me smile and tends to be right when I need an extra boost to my system.

I decorated the table for breakfast the night before. With the fun candy and games and books came a new red polo for my littlest Valentine. He loved the balloons and tried to reach every piece of candy he could by standing on his tippy toes and stretching his little fingers as far as they could go.

The rest of the day was spent making Valentines for his little friends in mommy school (matchboxes filled with mini mms),

doing some fun mess free finger paint

and last but not least, snuggling up with me and watching Mickey and Minnie Sweetheart tales.

Excited for it to start...

Not a big fan of the mean guy in one of the cartoons...

Happy that it all worked out in the end!

These are the old school Disney cartoons, you know the ones where they are a tad racist and not at all politically correct. Good times.

Then after Mark came home from work we had our favorite babysitter come and ordered her and Shortstop a heart shaped pizza while Mark and I went to Macaroni Grill for dinner. Mmmmm...carbs....

After dinner we succumbed to the cliche and went to The Vow.

And you know what? It was not a bad movie. I know Channing Tatum cannot act to save his life but he did well in this one. The best part of the movie was the girl sitting in the row ahead of us BAWLING her eyes out. Maybe I don't have a heart but I did not get teary eyed. In fact, Mark and I missed a scene because we were watching her so intently to make sure she was ok and breathing.

All in all it was a great day. Hope you all had a wonderful Valentine's day!