St Patricks Day is just around the corner...

This might seem cheesy to some, but since my marriage anniversary is on St. Patrick's day (lucky #13 this year) I thought I'd borrow this from my cousin and get into the very odd holiday spirit... My Leprechaun Name Is:

Tiny Greentoes

What's" Your Leprechaun Name?

(your name will be different every time you do it, so if you are like me you will keep doing it until something makes you laugh)

Valentines Day

My kids were so fun yesterday, we spent a few hours baking and decorating cookies to take to our neighbors... What ever happened to the old Valentines "ring and run" traditions? Well it continues in our home.. the kids love to leave the plates and ring the door bell and run... I think we may be the last family within miles to still do this! I remember being a kid and all of our neighbors did it as well.. it was a lot of fun and I have some great memories. So for my kids they enjoy the tradition as well. It was so nice, most of the neighbors called to say "thank you" it was sweet.

The schools here have a "no candy" rule, so the kids had to take cards only.. Hailey spent about 2 hours making the sweetest individual cards with unique poems for each of her classmates... it was really fun to watch her. Faith being in Middle school, came home with tons of candy... what the heck??? Noah enjoyed his Valentines party with his preschool co-op group, he came home with a "karate" gift certificate and home made crayons..... great alternatives to Candy.... but alas, I sent plastic hearts with Reese's pieces.... next year I'll try and be more creative :)

Mike was in Colorado so we didn't get to celebrate together... it's odd after being married for nearly 13 years you'd think we'd try a little harder for the romance... he e-mailed... that's how we communicate during the day (even when he's at home in NY in the office) he so romantically said.. "since we missed out on celebrating tonight, let's go to dinner on Saturday night, can you get a sitter?" How Romantic he is (HA HA HA). Don't get me wrong Mike can be so sweet and bring me flowers or chocolates or spa gift certificates, but I think he really doesn't get the "required romance" of Valentines day... hey, it's worked for this long so I'll just enjoy the moments he chooses to be sweet even more. I think it's partly my fault, for years he used to come home with a dozen long stemmed Red Roses every year on Valentine's day.. a few years ago when we were barely paying our bills out of school I made the mistake of telling him I felt guilty when he bought them because they are so expensive on V-day... well, I haven't had any since... Lesson learned... Good thing for Anniversaries!

Easter Help

Yikes, I know Valentines day was just yesterday but I've been starting to look ahead to next month.. Easter is early this year, and I'm determined to do something besides CANDY this year... we've made it a tradition to put coins and a few $1 bills in the eggs instead of all candy but still I really want to come up with something unique and fun for our Egg hunt this year. If you have any suggestions please share!!! It's hard to balance holidays with family tradtions... religious meanings and feel like I've suceeded. We do our Egg hunt on Saturday because growing up my mother refused to mix the "fun" Easter celebrations with the "true" easter celebrations so even though the "easter bunny" visited all of our Mormon neighbors on Sunday, he always came to our home on Friday night... looking back what a wonderful lesson this has taught me, and now with my own family I've continued it as well. The world is so full of "stuff" that I feel the need to seperate the 2, the holiday from the true meaning of the season... we do the same thing if Christmas falls on Sunday, Santa visits Friday night that year. I think for me it's been important to teach my children the difference between what the world celebrates and what we are truly celebrating during this very special holidays.