Valentines

I feel like I tend to shy away from being overly sentimental while writing on this blog, so hopefully I'll be forgiven for letting it all burst out in this one entry :) I just feel like pushing the pause button for a moment in my sometimes hectic life to talk about my kids. But you do this ALL the time on this blog, you might say, and you'd be right. But what I really want to talk about is what a miraculous gift having a child is. I know these are the moments to savor: being able to cuddle my baby and watch her half-smile in her sleep, to think about who she'll become, to have a constant reminder of the sheer joyfulness of living. To have real conversations with my three year old, read stories together, laugh at jokes "am I funny mom?" To remember what it was like to be learning about life for the first time. Being a parent has grounded me in life in ways I couldn't anticipate in my swingin' single days, fun as they were. I love it, and I love them . . .and I love Mike too. So, Happy Valentine's Day to all.

Avery exchanging Valentines at preschool. We needed to bring 25 cards and the Nerds candy valentines I bought only had 20 in the box. I asked Mike to grab some more Valentines and he came home with NBA Basketball cards. So, my three year old little girl, who is pretending to be a princess more often than not, gave out 5 cards of LeBron James.

For Valentine's Day, Mike and I (and Elliot) drove up to Suncadia, a lodge/resort thing in the Cascade Mtns. It was so nice to get away, have some time to talk and eat a fabulous meal with a wonderful view. Mike planned it all and it was great fun.

Our little Dee got to enjoy the Valentine's outing as well.

On Monday night we took the girls ice skating (with Owen and Jamie and their kids). Avery wanted to go fast, and was very frustrated with the whole "learning" thing. The rink had these buckets (as seen in picture) that kids could use to push themselves along, but Avery figured out that if she leaned her whole body on the bucket and ice-picked her skates like crazy she could get going pretty dang fast. It was one of the first times I've realized how much she has taken on characteristics of her parents; in this case, stubborness and recklessness and I'll let you decide which comes from which parent :)