Wednesday, February 16, 2011

Valentines Fun

I read a comment on a random blog the other day that said that Valentine’s Day is a one shot deal.  Either it happens on the 14th of February or it doesn’t happen at all.

 

My life is SO not that way.

 

We started our valentine’s fun last week when I baked and froze a bunch of cookies.  Sunday evening I pulled them out and made a new kind of frosting called Glace Icing.  I made the glace icing so we could decorate our cookies.  I thought they were so beautiful, and they turned out to be lots of fun to make.  It was even more fun because my dad & Ramona were here to decorate with us.

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On Valentine’s morning I got up early and made heart-shaped pancakes.  They were a big hit.  Then the little kids and I drove to Greensboro where we saw the play “Freedom Train,” and had our homeschool valentine’s party at Steak & Shake.  By the time we got home I was exhausted and that was the end of any festivities on Monday.

Tuesday I awoke refreshed and invigorated.  I planned a fun Valentines dinner and our annual Conversation Heart activity afterwards.  For dinner we had:

Heart shaped individual pizzas (made by the awesome Russ)

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and heart shaped stained glass jello.

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The kids loved the pizza and the jello, though they didn’t like the white part as much.  I want to make them again (with different colors of jello) for Easter, so I’m going to experiment to see if I can find something they like the taste of better for the white part.  (It was unflavored gelatin + sweetened condensed milk.)

After dinner came the real fun.  Plate sized heart shaped sugar cookies covered in pink frosting, and a table full of conversation hearts.  We passed the cookies around the table and took turns making messages for each person.

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I’m not very good at doing traditions, so when I stumble onto something that isn’t too much work, is yummy, and all the kids like to do, I try to remember it!  In the end everyone was happy with their cookies

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and we had fun reading all of our messages to each other.  (See the “M” at the top?  That was my identification—for “mom.”)

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And eating the cookies!

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Directions for glace icing here, and for making the cool cookies here.  You can find the jello directions here.

6 comments:

  1. Wow, I'm totally going to try the glace icing! So beautiful! I'm very impressed with all your Valentines food - wow! (And by the way... you look so skinny!)

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  2. What a fun tradition! I'm totally going to use this someday when I have my own family! Or any Primary calling. Thanks!

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  3. Very fun festivities! I like to spread out the holiday celebrating, too. What fun is it to plan so much and cram it all into one day and then just be DONE with the fun times when there are so many holiday options? =) p.s. I love "Our Best Bites"!

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  4. Looks like fun and a LOT of sugar...are you eating it now??? You're a fun mom and dad!

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  5. Those all look delicious, but the jello hearts are the ones I want to try first...how could sweetened condensed milk taste bad? What about using coconut milk?

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  6. I miss this! All I did for valentines day was eat a piece of pizza that I was told was from a heart-shaped pizza (I had to take their word for it, most of the pizza was gone by the time I got there).

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