Valentine's Week

*Disclaimer before I get started: I mention making a lot of treats in this post. Valentine's Day just wouldn't be Valentine's Day without treats. We shared our treats with neighbors and I was pretty good about only having one or two of each treat!

We spent all of last week celebrating Valentine's Day.

Monday night for FHE we dipped strawberry wafers.

The kids were my sprinkle assistants. (And I don't know why Peyton insisted on making this lovely face!)

During the week we put together valentines for Corbyn to take to school. It took him about an hour to write his name on all of them and I had to sit there the entire time keeping him on track. It was not our favorite hour spent together, but it was good practice for him.

We found these adorable little ducks at Macey's soon after they put out the Valentine's Day stuff and after a little searching on Pinterest, I found the perfect saying to go with them. I made the tags myself because I didn't love the one I found on Pinterest. After setting aside enough for Corbyn to take to school, we had a few left over for Peyton and Corbyn to take to their neighbor friends.

Friday night we got to go on a date thanks to our date night swap. We went to our newly opened Spanish Fork Zupas (soooooooo excited about this), shared a concrete at Culver's, and then worked on a puzzle.

Saturday morning the kids woke up to a few little Valentine's Day surprises. They each got a book (101 Dalmatians for Corbyn and The Three Bears for Peyton), a small toy (a Hot Wheels car for Corbyn and a Rapunzel Magiclip doll for Peyton), and some treats. They also got 101 Dalmatians (the movie) from Grandma and Grandpa Ririe.

I made us heart-shaped stuffed French toast and a pink smoothie for breakfast.

The kids were surprisingly pretty cooperative for their annual Valentine's Day shirt picture!

We had a bunch of bread crusts left over from breakfast, so we decided to go to the BYU duck pond to feed the ducks. It seems like those ducks are always overfed - they hardly even touched our bread!

But it was fun to get out and do something out of the ordinary. And we got to see these cute turtles lounging on this rock.

I remembered I have a picture of me and Corbyn at the duck pond when I was pregnant with Peyton (at 32 weeks), so I had Rog snap a similar one (at 34.5 weeks).

We had a fancy dinner with Maple-Glazed Pork Tenderloin, Creamy Mashed Potatoes, steamed broccoli, and a salad with our favorite Sweet Red Wine Vinaigrette (from Our Best Bites' Savoring the Seasons Cookbook). We made Cinnamon Cookie Crunch Popcorn for dessert and enjoyed it while watching 101 Dalmatians.

Sunday afternoon Peyton and I made a heart necklace and bracelet from a kit I got at Michael's. 

And then the kids helped me make Cranberry White Chocolate Bliss Bars. (My friend Megan had shared a couple with me a few weeks earlier and I was seriously craving them again!)

I ordered us some valentine mailboxes from Oriental Trading and finally finished decorating them with vinyl on Tuesday. Corbyn's and Peyton's were finished in time for Valentine's Day (as seen above).

And that was our Valentine's Day week!