Starving for Sunshine: My Valentine's

I love looking at other people's attempts to make a holiday special for their family, and usually I think that is awesome I could totally do that next year or the next holiday and then before I know it the special day is upon us and I have done nothing in preparation. Same goes for this year. Monday I was really dragging, a combination of winter and pregnancy. So I did not come prepared Tuesday morning for Dane's last tumbling class and party where most of the kids brought treats. He seemed rather disappointed and confused, though he bounced back quickly and tried to cut in on his friend and hand out their candy for them. So we headed to Target afterward so he could at least bring treats to his Cubbies party on Wednesday. As we were walking through the valentines section I saw some sprinkles. And by the way I have always loved Valentines day. I love the hearts, the pinks and reds, the decorations and all the cheesiness involved, and really why not have a day set aside to do something extra special for those you love, if we treated everyday the same then life would be boring. After grabbing the sprinkles I decided we should make some sugar cookies, which in my mind is almost a must, but after going mostly gluten free around here it has really taken the joy out of baking and I hardly do it anymore. But I remembered I had a GF sugar cookie mix in the pantry and a can of frosting which is very unusual around here since I much prefer the real stuff. But for this last minute idea it worked out perfectly.

The boys helped me mix them up. After naps Dane helped me decorate them and then we ate them together in the tent for a little party. We each had two, quite the sugar buzz, I tell you.

I had to bribe Dane with a cookie to get him to wear that shirt, then he insisted on the tie.

I had to continue to use the cookie as leverage in order to get a few pictures.

While we were making cookies I remembered Andy was making us a special dinner, and thought maybe I would try and decorate and make it a special valentine's party, so it wouldn't all be on Andy to make the meal nice. I went in search of anything red, pink or white that I could use to spiff the place up. I found a red streamer, and some Christmas wrapping paper to use for a table cloth. Some heart shaped bowls and pink flowers. And Dane found a red punching balloon that I confiscated until after dinner.