Love Day

I'm going to try alternating my blog posts--every other week I'll do a more current post, and on the off weeks I'll do throwback posts to the big things that happened in the past year or so that I never got around to posting because of pregnancy/newborn busyness.

I don't have a lot of pictures from the past week or so. Mostly I've been capturing little videos on my phone of the cute things Jack does, like standing unassisted, playing "soccer" while holding onto one of my fingers, or growling back at the dog when she growls at him for pulling her ears. I want to compile all the phone videos I've taken this past year for Jack's first birthday, but there are hundreds of them so it's a giant undertaking.

Valentine's Day was a bit of a mixed bag this year. The night before, I had YW New Beginnings, and when I got home I stayed up until midnight cleaning the house, doing a mountain of dishes, and preparing for Valentine's Day. Jared wasn't much help because he's on a rotation where he has to go to sleep early so he can wake up early. Once I finally finished getting everything ready, the dog started scratching to go out to the bathroom, so I let her out and she ran off for half an hour! (We will be putting in a fence immediately after the ground starts to thaw in the spring. We've already set aside the money for it.) Then I was up at 5:30 in the morning on Valentine's Day to make a cute waffle breakfast for Jared before work. I was able to catch another hour of sleep after that before Jack woke up for the day, but I was exhausted. Unfortunately, Jack was cutting 3 teeth and had maybe his whiniest day ever. With how exhausted I was I did not handle it well. The holiday involved lots of tears, one freezing walk in 40 mph wind when I HAD to get some fresh air to calm down, and an emergency trip through the McDonald's drive-thru with lots of snack for Jack to keep him quiet on the way. This picture pretty much sums up how the day went:

When Jared got home from work, we gave Jack some Tylenol and put him to bed early. Jack's early bedtime is my salvation. I don't know what I would do without those quiet evening hours to recompose myself, spend time with Jared, and have some "me" time. On Valentine's Day, after Jack went down Jared and I had crepes for dinner, just like on our first date. Then we played Bananagrams using words that had to do with love, and afterward we watched the first half of The Princess Bride (the movie we watched on our first Valentin's Day together, which is also the day we decided to get married) before we both started falling asleep at 9:00 and called it a night. Even though it was a rough day with Jack, I ended up having a nice, low-key evening with Jared. He even brought me flowers and a card. What a guy.

 ^^My Valentines

^^The eclectic outfit I threw on to go to the McDonald's drive thru. The sweatshirt dress is the only red I own, and I love those floral booties but never wear them. They were easy to slip on.

^^Quick family selfie to document Jack's first Valentine's Day before we chucked him into his crib for the night. I know our mouths are smiling, but our tired eyes tell the real story here.