Valentine's Day

Hey All! Did you have a great Valentine's weekend?
Mine was...interesting.

Friday night it began with a trip - by myself! - to the mall in Winnipeg to try and find a dress for an upcoming wedding that Rob and Ellie are both a part of. Perhaps this wasn't really part of Valentine's day, but it's a cool story, so bear with me. :)

My old black dress wasn't fitting quite right since the kids were born, and the only other one I own is my maternity dress. No thanks! So it was high time to find a new dress...something I was not looking forward to. It's not much fun shopping for something that one doesn't really enjoy wearing, you know? ANYHOW, before I left Rob and I discussed my budget and he gave me quite a high number just in case I ended up having to buy new EVERYTHING (underwear, etc.) along with the dress. I told him not to worry, that I was aiming for a dress around $50.

So I got to the mall, asked God to please help me out, took a deep breath, and then hit just about every store that might have a dress in it. To no avail. I tried on three dresses but they all sucked. All the salespeople seemed too busy to help. Finally when I got to the last store I desperately prayed, "Jesus, please send someone to help me! Apparently I don't know how to find a dress on my own."

And then I started at the beginning again, at a store called Smart Set. Wouldn't you know, someone (finally!) came to help me...a young saleslady. I'm pretty sure she'll never forget the look of desperation on my face when I told her my plight. She didn't seem too concerned. In fact, she looked almost excited to help a poor special needs shopper like myself. She led me up to a rack of dresses I hadn't seen on my first trek around the mall and said, "How about this one?" And pulled out a dress that...I actually liked! And in my size (which is almost impossible to find)!
So I went to try it on, and as I hung it on the peg in the wall I noticed the price tag: $50.00. Not $49.99. Nope. FIVE. ZERO. Exactly the number I had told Rob. And I knew that yet again, God had answered His child's cry for help. In buying a silly dress, of all things. He really does care about the small details of our lives.
So, not only does this dress fit like it was sewn for me, but it's MODEST and I won't have to worry about flashing people as I chase after Ellie all day. I also got a camesole for underneath, a necklace, pantihose and new shoes all for about $100. Hopefully it stays in style for at least 10 years, because that's about how often I'd like to go shopping for a dress. :) Unless, of course, the shopping trip goes like this one did.

So Saturday I worked all day selling cheesy white teddy bears holding red hearts to expectant boyfriends and tired husbands desperately hoping that they were buying their women the gift of their dreams. It was interesting taking note of all the different attitudes these men held towards romancing their girls! Some were obviously begrudging the fact that they were in a gift store. Others were downright nervous. The best ones had a twinkle in their eye and said things like "Every day is Valentine's day with my wife!" Okay. There was only one that said that. Anyhow...

I was curious if Rob would have anything planned for our Valentine's evening, seeing as he was preaching the next morning and his sermon wasn't done yet. We don't usually put a lot of effort into Valentine's day, so I wasn't expecting much.

We got home and I found out that Joshua had made me his very own special Valentine's gift - a broken lamp (thanks Joshua)! And Rob had done his best to make a Valentine's meal for the family...a casserole which is now affectionately called, "Fiasco Casserole." You see, the broken lamp incident happened right in the middle of the casserole preparations...resulting in some ginormously overdone noodles, some rock hard ground beef...and well, I won't get into the rest. I totally appreciated Rob's effort. :)

It's an interesting thing, being married to a teacher/preacher. Rob, knowing that he wasn't going to have any time to do anything for Valentine's that night but still wanting me to feel special, quickly threw three old sunflower seeds from the top shelf of our cupboard into an envelope. Then he scribbled, "Happy Valentine's Day" on the outside. He could have just said, "Don't worry, Darling, I have something planned for us for tomorrow". But instead he told me to put the seeds in a cup of water...and that if I was patient, they would grow. (i.e. he had three things planned for Valentine's day, but I'd have to wait.) Perhaps a bit of a half-baked illustration, but I would certainly give him points for effort! :) He is a very sweet guy.

So Sunday I got my first "seed". Rob took me out for dinner to our favourite local restaurant and we had a wonderful time talking about deep and not-so-deep things, and later after we put the kids to bed we watched a movie, something we haven't had time to do in a loong time. It was perfect. Apparently there are two more seeds to come yet, so I'll have to let you know what they turn out to be!

Yikes. This is turning out to be a long post with very few photos. Apologies to my more visually-oriented friends out there. Here's a few pictures to make up for my long-windedness:

Ellie and I spent a lot of time writing out her Valentine's cards, and I was very surprised when (I guess after practicing her name so many times) she suddenly did this:

I had to coach her which letters came in what order, of course, but what a neat milestone to witness her reaching!

I didn't find time this week to bake my all-time favourite cookies, but was super blessed when my mom gave us a whole bag full of them for our Valentine's treat!
The kids were pretty pumped, too.

So anyways, I'll leave you with a few of Ellie and Joshua's 1 and 3 year photos (taken by a friend) that are currently being sent to all you Balfours and Fargeys along with Ellie's valentines!


P.S. comments have been few and far in between lately so I'll leave my quiet friends out there with a question to answer: what was your favourite part of Valentine's Day this year?