Valentine’s!
We ended up having a really nice family Valentine’s Day yesterday. I am so proud of Erik–he is getting to be so thoughtful and mature. It is really nice to see all the blood, sweat and tears we’ve put into making him a good citizen pay off. Elsa is still in the feral animal stage, which can be so disheartening, then we look over at him and see that yes, indeed, thoughtful parenting will eventually create a thoughtful kid.
When I went to bed the night before, I left a Valentine’s gift out for each family member (excluding myself). When Erik realized I didn’t have a gift he was very, very upset and immediately started making me cards, giving me his chocolate, and telling me how much he loved me. He sacrificed his chocolate for me! That’s huge! I also got a card from a secret admirer, so I told Mike he better watch out! Haha! It was fairly obvious who the secret admirer was–the handwriting was very Eightish.
We spent Friday morning making Valentine’s for the kids’ parties (they were delayed till Tuesday since Friday was a snow day) and Erik spent a long time thinking about the cards for each individual child. It was pretty cool to have a “boy” pack and “girl” pack of Valentines so he could semi-customize each card. He gave most of the girls a card from Frozen, but the girl he hangs out with got a Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle card. I was amused (and yes, we did have a talk about gender roles and there not really being things that are for boys and for girls, that anyone can like anything).
I know this sounds silly, but I am just so proud of him for recognizing that not every body likes the exact same thing he likes. He’s getting empathy! It’s a long road for a child to develop empathy, but it’s a beautiful thing when it finally happens.
It was also funny because I told him we had M&Ms to tape on the cards and he was coming up with all kinds of crazy schemes to tape them on individually. He didn’t realize they came in single serving bags.
Later, when Mike came home with flowers and a card, I pointed them out to Erik to show that he didn’t have to feel sad for me. He was quite put out and wanted me to know that his gift was much better than his father’s gift. We were definitely getting some Oedipal vibes.
Then!
Then!
Last night he declared he was going to sleep with us, and wouldn’t get out of my bed until I rather forcibly kicked him out. That never happens, so I was wondering how much he realized about Valentine’s being the holiday of love and if he was subconsciously or even consciously trying to prevent some lovin’.
I made Mike an origami fortune teller (more commonly known as a cootie catcher) with date nights listed on the inside. We didn’t have a babysitter scheduled and the roads were crap, so going out was not in the cards for us. I hate going out on Valentine’s anyway. I find crowds very overwhelming.
He ended up picking fondue night followed by chocolate, so we did a family fondue night. The original idea was some sexy chocolate time, but let’s face it. We are old, have little children that might interrupt us at any moment, and had just washed the sheets. We made chocolate fondue and had regular vanilla sex after the kids were in bed. With kids, that’s about as exciting as we get (and it is plenty good enough for me).
My mom is talking about coming over in April, so I’d really like to plan a date night while she’s here. I want to go into DC and either do a walking tour or see a show, then go to a fancy restaurant and stay at a nice hotel for a relaxing evening of fun. Nothing says relaxing like listening for little footsteps out of one ear.