My Little Valentines!

I like Valentine's Day. I know what they say: it's just a dumb Hallmark Holiday. And while I do agree with that, now that I have kids I enjoy it so much more than I used to! There are just so many fun activities for kids to do around this time each February. We are going to Valentine storytime at the bookstore on Saturday. I get to pick out some little Valentine treasures for my little Valentines to open on that special day. And Calli had a fun Valentine's party at her preschool on Tuesday.

We went shopping on Sunday for supplies. I knew most of the other moms were going to put together little goody bags for the kids and I didn't want to be left out! I love doing this sort of thing so it was off to Michaels. I always get the same take-out boxes anytime I put something like this together and luckily they had Valentine's themed ones. I immediately picked them up, even though I didn't know what would go in there yet. Calli picked out her Valentines she wanted to hand out (Hannah Montana of course!) and then we looked around trying to find the perfect things to put in the boxes. Now, I have fun with these, but I also recognize the fact that, as a parent, I hate to get a bunch of junk that I'll just end up throwing away. I also didn't want to get a bunch of candy because I don't appreciate that either! So I found a cupcake mix that came with a heart cookie cutter to cut out the top of a cupcake and fill with icing. Well, I didn't need a kit for that, I could do it on my own! I got Valentine ziplock bags to put the cupcakes in and also some heart shaped bubbles to stick in the boxes. (I also printed out Chuck E Cheese valentines online that you can bring in for five tokens!).

Here is a filled box

Monday I made and decorated the cupcakes and they turned out pretty cute if I do say so myself.

I sat down with Calli later so she could write out her valentines. I wanted her to write each of the kids' names on them instead of me doing it (it turned out that she was the only one in her class that did it herself!). I wrote out the name for her and she copied it, as you can see in the first picture of the box with the card on top. She is a pro at writing her name so the "from" part was easy. I was very proud of her for writing all those names out.

She had a lot of fun at her school party and brought home way too much candy and sweets of course! But I suppose that's how things are supposed to be on Valentine's Day. Richard and I are excited to celebrate our Valentine's Day as well because the YMCA is having a Parent's Night Out on Saturday evening. We'll be leaving the kids there from 6-10 and hopefully seeing a movie or at the very least going out for a kid-free meal.

And here are my little goofballs...I mean Valentines!

Love this photo!

And they toppled over...