Valentine's Day

Usually Valentine's falls over President's Day weekend. The problem? Well, you see, I run a high school conference over that weekend every year and we often have to celebrate on a different day. that is a score for me, because I get stuff at half price and don't have to wait ridiculous amounts of time for a restaurant. Sunday, I was talking with my small group guys and mentioned what they were supposed to remember for our meeting on Monday. One of them said, "Are we meeting on Valentine's day?" Whoops. "No, we are not."

I then had to start putting a plan into motion. I know Jeanne-Ann does not always like surprises, so I gave her some options. I went out and bought steak and some other food and I was going to cook it up...or we could go out to dinner somewhere. Then we could go out after that. She wanted to stay in for dinner and then go to one of our favorite date places we haven't been to in a while...Borders. We like to go and grab a book or two and sit down with a drink and just enjoy some books together. That was the plan.

When I woke up in the morning I could smell the cinnamon rolls in the air. Jeanne-Ann made some yummy, gooey cinnamon rolls that were absolutely amazing! I had cut out hundreds of hearts and put them all over the floor and Karston decided he wanted to do that too, so he added his own into it. I had also used the poster board Jeanne-Ann got to write a poem on for each of the kids. Fun morning.

Then the rain came with a vengeance. It would not be optimal weather to grill the steaks outside that evening. So we ended up ordering in. Both the kids called into our local radio station to wish me a happy Valentine's Day (not sure why they didn't call for both of us, but I'm not complaining). We were able to capture Karston's call on video.

Kynzi had her first babysitting gig, so we hunkered down in the bedroom and started watching a King Arthur movie, but lasted only 20 minutes and we changed it out for Hitch. We both love that movie! All in all it was a wonderful day. More subdued than normal but a great time together anyhow.

How did you spend your Valentine's Day?

How Would Life Differ If It Were More Fun?

Have you ever taken a moment that wasn't all that great and made it more fun and completely changed how you felt? No? Maybe it's time to do just that. This probably means you need to turn on some creative juices. When Jeanne-Ann and I were dating in college, neither of us had a lot of money. While many of our friends would run up to Buffalo (1 hr drive) and go to the movies, etc. we would stay on campus. We had to get creative with our dates.

For our first valentines together I decided to write out our story on a posterboard using those candies that say things on them. I used a whole bunch of them and hung them up in the elevator of Jeanne-Ann's dorm. Needless to say the elevator ride became much more fun than just getting to your destination. As a matter of fact many stayed on until they finished reading it.

On our first dating anniversary I used what was available to me to make our celebration an evening to remember. I worked ski patrol at our school (we had a 5 slope "mountain") so I had the keys to the lodge. I made a giant heart in the snow and had music playing in there when we walked in (after driving her around blindfolded for a while so she would think we were far away from campus.) Then I had some snacks, sparkling cider and we danced (shhh...don't tell anyone. That was against the rules). It was awesome!

It didn't take much to turn the mundane into fun. You don't have to be super creative, you can do it too. Look at what VW did in order to make a viral video. They did some testing to see if they could make the mundane fun...like walking up the stairs over taking an escalator. It's an awesome video. They actually have 3 experiments in the works. Check em out.

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