A New Tradition

A few years back, my friend Allie invited me to a gingerbread house making party. In February. We used all Valentine's Day candies and it turned out great! I found a photo of my house a few months back (although I can not find it now) and Princess was totally enthralled with it. She carried it around for days (which is probably why I can't find it now).


I wanted to do gingerbread at Christmas, but we were just too busy... so I agreed to a Valentine's Day gingerbread extravaganza. We used graham crackers and this icing and general pattern. It was so fun and we will definitely do this again. These were the results! The first one is Papa's, the second one is Princess' and the last one is Mama's. As you can see, Papa choose a slightly less conventional design :)

February catch up

I so wanted to post more in February, but the month got away from me. The weather has finally turned warmer and the kids and I are getting out more these days, which is great. We all have miserable colds as of last night though, so sadly, I think church will have to wait another week.

Valentine's Day was nice. My husband remembered flowers and cards for the three of us & a big box of chocolate for mama. Packages came from both of my parents which included some junk food and lots of fun stuff for the kids. It was a pretty low-key day, and I made Princess a Valetine's Day lunch she loved of red anjou pears cut like a heart, red organic corn chips & a toasted, heart-shaped, almond butter and lingonberry jam sandwhich.

Princess choose the dinner menu: asparagus (which she'd only heard of), roasted turkey (okay so we did chicken since it is hard to find a whole turkey for a reasonable price in February), garlic mashed potatoes & gravy (my husband's favorite), caprese salad, more red pear slices, fresh rolls, and sparkling cranberry juice. It was all good, but the caprese salad was amazing--the ingredients were fresh and wonderful.

We also had cookies that we made and sent to my family from the recipe I posted in January. We did three varieties: cranberry with white chocolate, blueberry with milk & white chocolate, and chocolate caramel coconut pecan. We made 15 dozen and everyone we gave them to said nice things.