Valentine's Day 2016

We had a very chocolate-y Valentine's Day yesterday. :) We decided to celebrate it a day early since our Sundays are SO CRAZY and we barely see Travis at all.

Since we're still working on Jaxon's reading, yesterday morning I left a note telling him where to find his Valentine's Day treats.

Then after breakfast and our daily list of to-dos, we went to my parents to make chocolate covered strawberries. I think the kids ate more chocolate than strawberries. In this clip (since there's no captions), I ask him how the strawberries taste, and he says "They're very good, thank you!"

As my mom said, he was thoroughly enjoying himself. Especially when he just licked the spoon. Thank heavens no one else was using that bowl.

Violet was also able to participate in the sugary mess...

While the strawberries were setting, they enjoyed a Valentine's Day craft with Mamie. I thought this was so cute and so easy!

I had to pre-treat chocolate stains on his shirt during this time, ugh

That evening, we had our traditional lasagna by candlelight dinner followed by chocolate covered strawberries, and our traditional cheesecake which we still haven't made a dent in because we are chalk full of sugar.

I kind of made a new tradition this year. I found this cute door cover of a tree and you put hearts all around it with people's names on it. It's supposed to be for classroom doors, but it worked great for the kitchen. One day after preschool, Jaxon and I sat down and wrote names of people we loved on each heart.

During Valentine's day dinner, we asked Jaxon to point out the people he wrote on his hearts and tell us why he loved him/her. It was a very sweet Valentine's Day! :)

Hunkered down

We're kind of in survival mode this winter. Despite my best efforts of trying to get out of the house with the kids, we're still experiencing some cabin fever. We've mostly just hunkered down till the first signs of spring. Yes, I know we've got a ways to go. So we've tried to keep ourselves busy.

Christmas presents help keep Jaxon busy. He's found a new interest in all things electrical (along with the usual mechanical)... a potentially hazardous hobby to be sure.

Jaxon's work

Playing with his circuit set

And then this is just typical Jaxon...

Violet just keeps herself busy by the usual methods...

We replaced our closet doors so I thought it'd be cool to let them use the old doors as a slide. Perfect indoor activity, right? Although now Violet's scared of it and won't even let me slide down without it causing tears. But she loves to watch Jaxon slide down for some reason...

This is a fun game Jaxon made up. It's called, "Da vezen campan", which is Aught (his made up language) for chase. I love seeing them play together.