Lots of Love

I've been busy crafting and cooking in the kitchen, getting ready for Valentines day.  Here's some snippets of our Heart Day plans.

A few decorating projects are finished.  I made some heart garlands inspired by ideas from the web,

one simple

and one a little more complicated.  I had a few more decorating projects that didn't get completed.  Maybe for next year...

I've been in the kitchen baking sugar cookies.  Normally, I use my favorite sour cream sugar cookie recipe, but I wanted to try something new.  Paradise Bakery sugar cookies sounded like just the thing, so I tried them out. 

They are yummy, but I would definitely use a different frosting.  It was a little weak to me.  I prefer cream cheese frosting myself.

We also had our favorite Cody pancakes for breakfast (pink of course for Valentine's Day). 

Don't you love Mr. Three's hair?

I found these Valentine web games for the boys to play while I cooked dinner.

On the menu:

Fettuccine Alfredo (with some red food coloring)
roasted asparagus (which the boys will probably not touch, but we'll give it a try)
bread sticks
raspberry jello
sugar cookies
hot chocolate

We set the table and lit candles to have a fancy dinner together.  We emphasized using extra fancy manners as well.  (One can only hope...)  They seemed to really like that, although we still had whining about eating asparagus and at least one child eating with their hands instead of the forks and spoons...

Excerpt from the table (can you relate?):

Mom:  "You can use your spoon to eat your jello."
Mr. Two:  "Oh, that would be good!" (Grabs the jello with his hands and plops it onto the spoon.)
Mom: (to Dad, under breath) "I give up."
Mr. Three:  (pats jello with hand and pokes it with fingers)

Ah, memories!

Here are the little gifts that I (and Mike) have been working on to give the little Mr.'s.

For Mr. One and Mr. Two

Boyville peg dolls (we had to add Batman to the mix).  My handsome husband did all the detail work.  He is a creative wonder!  It was a really fun project to work on together.

For Mr. Three

This basic apron (I added a pocket because every boy needs a pocket) for my newest little kitchen helper.

The Valentines here and here for all three, because they are super kids.

I also had so much fun thinking up little love notes and hiding them for my husband to find these past 14 days.  I think he enjoyed finding and reading them, too.

We had a day full of love and hope all of you did as well!  Happy Heart Day!