Valentine's Day

This was our first Valentine's Day as a family of three. My mom always got us jelly bean, chocolate and I have vague memories of stuffed animals. I wanted to start a similar tradition at our house. E is clearly clearly too small for candy and sugar -even though I caught my mother-in-law giving E some 3 Musketeers bar the other day - but that's what grandma's are for, right. Anyways, Lee said he wanted yellow cake with chocolate frosting so I made pink cake - thank you red food coloring - with chocolate frosting cupcakes with red decorations! They were cute and I can definitely see making them again. For the record the Bibis did not have one - although I have big big plans for the 1st birthday cake pictures.

Rewind to earlier that morning when flowers arrived at work - but they weren't for me. Lee did have flowers for me at home which was so nice. I am much more of a live plant/ live flower person than fresh cut flowers. Its totally more sustainable and I think you get your money's worth. (I am sooo green!)

This post is completely out of order in terms of sequence of events but you will get the point. So in the middle of all this E and I went to probably one of my favorite stores in the Mount (we don't have a very good selection here so no judging) Hallmark!!! Hallmark is sooo great. The Christmas ornaments they have are so nice and the people who work their are so friendly. So with E in tote I got Lee's card and E's card (I made sure she was not looking), picked up a box of candies for Lee - total rip off, only 12 candies for 8 bucks, I will do better next year -, and a little frogman for Lee. I found this super cute frog for E too and it was not horribly expensive so we headed home. Lee came into the cupcakes and the cards and chocolate and he also got me a Yankee Candle - so great! E woke up from her nap and we let her open her card and squeeze her new froggie friend - all on camera.

Well won't you know within the first minute of E having the frog she finds a hole in the back!!! A. just my luck and B. the beebster is so detail oriented it is crazy (she will pick a specks of dirt and find little pieces of junk on the floor rather than play with her toys) So off to Hallmark to exchange. I was hoping for another green frog because the first Valentine's Day with the green frog was already on camera. No luck. Came home with a pink elephant. I was bummed. The next morning I am getting ready for work and E is now playing with the elephant and lo and behold ANOTHER HOLE!!!

I decided to 'throw in the towelette' (as Lee would say) on the stuffed animals and splurged on the squeaky shoes. These things are AMAZING! Every child needs squeaky shoes. They squeak when the child walks and come in super cute designs. A wise sister in law of mine said that she tries to cut the noise level from her house and I totally believe her but for now I am sticking with the squeaks!!! I'll have to do a special post on my sister in law (I have two and both are so great) but one has kids closer in age to E so she is the expert on all things bibis...

In summary Valentines was a start of new traditions but Hallmark better step up next year!