I Love You Day
2/14/2009 11:01:00 PM Edit This 2 Comments »
Since I spent a good part of my morning listening to Pooh, Manny, Lola, Mickey and the rest of the Disney gang talking about Valentines day I came to realize that yes, most people think of it as a day for lovers but kids see it as a day to make sure to say I love you to the important people in their lives. That is certainly how I am celebrating it this year and it's one of the best Valentines Days I've every had.
Just being able to watch my little Valentine dance and sing whenever the mode struck her was such a pleasure and then to have her grab my hands and say "Dance with me Mommy" was the best invitation to dance I've ever had. She has such a zest for life and wants to share each new discovery with me that I find myself looking for something "new" to show her or teach her or share with her. Last weekend we baked cookies for the first time and what a hoot my little baker girl was! Of course she first had to accessorize her outfit from the apron and oven mitt to the pink hat and pink boots before she could begin. Then she couldn't wait to get her hands on...well everything.
Did I mention she liked licking? Licking the spatula, the spoon and the beaters was of course the highlight of the event. Have no fear though, anything I caught her licking I made sure didn't go back into the dough. Not to say that my back wasn't turned to her now and then but no one who ate them got sick so what more could a Mom ask for?
Of course once the licking was done, I mean the batter was ready I cleaned up so we could scoop the cookies on to the baking sheets which meant that Lexie needed to have a wardrobe change or at least her hats. Her old favorite, the green top hat, was a must for the scooping and counting of the first tray of cookies. I have to say after the first batch went in the oven my little helper was a little too impatient to sit around and wait for the timer to go off. So she went out into her kitchen to bake me some of her cookies. Yummy, they were "alicious!"
Then on Sunday we made Valentines for the family and her friends. I can't tell you how much she loves to paint and draw and create in general. For a child that is not even three yet, she can stay extremely focus on something she enjoys and painting is on the top of her list. So we used markers and stickers and glitter paint and finally paints to create these master pieces of love (all 28 of them.) She took well over an hour to do them and she would have gladly made more if I hadn't run out of construction paper (and room under the cabinets to hang them.)
As you can see she takes it very seriously and really wants to mix the colors and fill the pages and she's even started making shapes or pictures on them. She is so much my daughter in that way as I always enjoyed drawing and painting but I just never find the time anymore. Sharing these projects with her has made me want to get back into it. She and I may be fighting over the finger paints in the near future.
Since her hands were dirty anyway I decided to try to get her hand prints on paper as all my other attempts have failed. I have thrown away 3 different plaster hand print kits so far but this time she thought it was funny that Mommy wanted her to get her hands really messy and let me get several prints before she decided to try finger painting instead of just pushing her hands onto the paper. I'm planning on adding a picture to the top of the paper and framing it. My problem will be in picking just one picture. As you can probably guess I love taking pictures of my sweet pea and she is one photogenic little girl, so we're a match made in heaven.
Our Valentines Day may not have had cupid involved in it but in my opinion it couldn't have been better. So ring the bells and dance around and as Tigger & Pooh & Darby too say "Happy I Love You Day!"
