Valentine's Love

There was lots of love this Valentine's Day! We started the morning off with a few treats for our little ones. They had heart shaped pancakes and eggs. Kolter received new gloves and a zippy cup. Nora got a new cup, jump rope and Stuffy (best $1 clearance purchase ever). And Daddy also got her a flower (which is totally her love language…every time she sees him she thanks him for her BEAUTIFUL flowers :) Sawyer received a set of pens, new scissors and a dry erase board. I think he felt a little short changed but can you tell we are trying to encourage his fine motor skills?

After breakfast we had some family snuggle time

Then I took a picture with all my loves! This never happens so it was to get in a few shots.

Earlier in the week Kyle told me we were going out for V-day. I was kind of incredulous because we never go out on Valentine's and I didn't really want to battle the crowds. But I let it go and Saturday afternoon we got ready for a night on the town. According to Kyle the babysitter was supposed to arrive at 4 pm, but 4 pm came and went and the babysitter never came. Kyle set up the child care and it was a new person I had never met. Kyle was getting upset with her tardiness. I promptly thought we would never use her again. Kyle seemed to be getting pretty angry, but finally at 4:45 a van pulls into our driveway. I look outside to see a group of my friends! Obviously Kyle had been fibbing about our plans.

I don't know if I've mentioned it on the blog but over the past 6 months I've become good friends with a wonderful group of ladies. We get together at least monthly for a girls night and we stay out to all hours of the night talking. It's good for this momma's soul.

Anyway back to Valentine's Day. A few of them arrive at my doorstep with a clue. Apparently the husbands had set up a scavenger hunt and a date night for the ladies. We searched for the clue in the house and found gourmet cupcakes for our dinner then the ladies whisked me away to pick up a few more girls.

Once all the girls were together our final clue included a mixed CD to listen too and an assignment to find the largest image of our 2 "favorite" celebrities: Lebron James and Jimmy Fallon. I think this was a stall tactic to allow the boys to get the dinner fixed :) We're always up for a challenge though. We decided to tackle Lebron first since we live in NE Ohio we knew it wouldn't be difficult to a large image. We hit up Dick Sporting Goods and they didn't disappoint. We quickly found a Lebron beach towel along with a plethora of other Lebron apparel. We asked a random stranger to take a picture and that part of the assignment was complete.

Next up, Jimmy Fallon. We didn't really know where to go, so on a whim we decided to check the nearby Target. We went to the electronics section to see if we could find an SNL DVD or magazine. We wanted to somehow project him on the TV wall, but really had no way to accomplish this wish. The TV's were all displaying the Target channel and we couldn't find an associate. As we were lamenting about the poor prospects of finding a large image of Jimmy Fallon all of the TV's on the wall turned to a Jimmy Fallon commercial. We all ran to the wall screaming and snapping pictures. Everyone was staring at us (we might have been making a scene), so we called a woman over (we made her hustle) to snap of picture of all of us. It was literally a Valentine's Day miracle!

After the scavenger hunt we headed to one of their houses for a delicious meal. Most of the husbands served as kitchen help while one of the husbands demonstrated his excellent culinary skills. We had a pear salad and choice of beef or chicken served on top of risotto. Then we capped it off with a cupcake. It was all so delicious!

the beautiful table setting

After dinner the men cleaned up while the girls chatted. Then we played the Newlywed Game and learned a lot more about each other ;) I am so thankful for this great group of friends!

The guys planned the whole thing from the dinner to the scavenger hunt clues. They did a fantastic job and it was a wonderful Valentine's Day!

Traditionally on Valentines Day we do a family fondue night. Since we weren't home on V-Day we moved it Sunday.

Fondue is always a hit! Nora and I love anything in chocolate. Sawyer had a few bits of chocolate covered strawberry and then declared he just wanted the strawberries…what? And Kolter had the pleasure of tasting his 1st strawberry…he liked it a LOT!