<p>The recent question at work has been “So… what are your plans for v-day?”… "Did you get so and so anything for v-day yet?.. blah blah blah… So here is my vent on the topic…</p>
<p>I personally have never really been a fan of the day. I know some people call it a Hallmark holiday and this and that but I just don’t know. I don’t even really look at it that way but to me it seems like that’s the one day out of the year that people go extremely out of their way to tell the other person how they feel and then they go back to “normal” the entire rest of the year. Maybe I’m naive but I don’t want someone being extra nice to me just because it’s Valentine’s Day… I want someone being extra nice to me every day. ;)</p>
<p>One of my co-workers is taking his girlfriend out to dinner and he told me the place he made a reservation at some place that is $75 dollars a plate. He actually came in and worked overtime on his day off to have the extra money to take her out. I wouldn’t want my BF to forfeit a day off just to be able to take me out for some crazy overpriced meal. I had a roommate once whose boyfriend never went out on a date with her anywhere - except one date per year. Valentine’s Day. </p>
<p>I did actually see the cutest thing the other day that I contemplated buying for my BF this year - a build a bear of an abominable snowman with a cute golfing outfit. I’m sure it would sit in his closet and there’s probably no way he would keep a stuffed animal sitting out in his house, but I thought it was the funniest thing and almost broke down and bought it as a v-day gift. We’ll probably cook each other a nice meal and enjoy each others company, just like every other Monday. I’m contemplating buying us GT5 for the PS3 with a gift card I just got from work, so maybe we’ll have video game playing and dinner. Sounds like good time to me! ;)</p>
<p>So my question to you guys is, do you celebrate? Do anything? Give a gift? Dinner? Quality time alone? Am I alone in my feelings here? Maybe I’m just weird!!</p>
<p>DH and I do not do gifts, chocolates or the sterotypical Valentines’ mushy stuff, but I use this made-up holiday as an excuse for us to dress nicely and eat at a fancy place. This year, I made reservations at our favorite restaurant which will be serving “regular menu” according to its website (thank you, Chef Howie!).</p>
<p>When I was dating, I always got SOMETHING, whether it was a card or flowers or a small piece of jewelry & gave something small (card, candy, something small). Since I’ve been married, it’s been mostly similar–maybe a pot of mums from hubby or other small potted flowers from the grocery store and maybe a card. I make a nice dinner at home because we don’t want to fight the crazy crowds on VD (unless we’re going to the opera as part of the regular season–2nd Friday in Feb, then we make reservations & have dinner with my folks before the opera).</p>
<p>Absolutely! Valentine’s Day is the most important day of the year! It comes at the perfect time to pick everyone up from the midwinter blahs!
Growing up, Valentine’s Day was my parent’s anniversary AND my little brother’s birthday. And dear H proposed on Feb. 14th!
I really make a big deal to celebrate with a family dinner with the best china and crystal. The menu is always the same and features strawberries sliced in a spinach salad (to look like hearts!) and chocolate amaretto pudding in dessert goblets with red heart sprinkles on top.
Fendergirl, I hope that this will become just as special a day to you and your BF one day :)</p>
<p>Okay, this is my rant. Just like Christmas, I appreciate the sentiment of the day, I just resent the hell out of being told how to express it. I always thought the most outrageous political smear I ever heard was when Michael Dukakis got dinged for giving his wife a waffle iron for Valentine’s Day. It wasn’t “romantic”. Crap! Maybe it was something she really wanted, maybe it came with a promise of waffles every morning. </p>
<p>Several years ago I was having a bad winter – I had a never ending cold, I was always tired and freezing cold, I was dragging around the house in patched together sweat clothes and bathrobe that had seen me through nursing 2 infants. I wasn’t really sick, I just looked and felt like hell, but I was being the MOM. For Valentine’s Day my husband gave me a new flannel bathrobe, warm slippers,and a new tea-kettle. He tucked me up in bed and let me spend the whole day being"sick". It was wonderful, just what I needed and the most romantic Valentine’s Day ever. It showed me that he loved me enough to disregard convention and give me what I really wanted and needed.</p>
<p>Lololu: I received a waffle iron for Valentine’s day! It makes heart waffles and I just love it! I am all about cute and the kids love it. Who knew Michael Dukakis was such a sweetheart to his wife??</p>
<p>Fendergirl, I almost forgot - the salad has to have hearts of palm :)</p>
<p>ksm, I can appreciate how cute a heart salad is… but I don’t know. It’s really just not me. We do cute things like that all the time, we don’t need to be told which day to do them… I think that’s my issue with the day. You sure do have a lot of occasions taking place on that day!!! To each their own though. You are making me hungry for strawberries!! :)</p>
<p>lololu, my BF got me an electric griddle and a box of pancake mix and a big spatula as part of my gifts for Christmas. First I thought it was funny, but he’s used it cooked me breakfast at least three times over the past month! I’d say it’s one of the best gifts of the year, lol! It the gift that just keeps on feeding me!!! Kind of like the iron story I guess! Your story reminded me of something else too… Last year I was home sick from work and he decided to surprise me by taking a half day. He came over with chicken noodle, my favorite drink, a slice of cheese cake with little chocolate chip kisses on top (that he obviously put on there, I found the little baggie of chocolate chips open and stored in my kitchen cabinet, haha)… and then told me those were feel better kisses. I practically melted it was so cute. After I ate lunch he tucked me in, did all of the dishes and cleaned my house!</p>
<p>I’m sure he’ll get me some kind of Reese’s candies for v-day. He has given me a baggie of them the past two years. They’re my favorite. He picks them up for me every time he goes grocery shopping and puts them in my stocking at Christmas also. Sometimes I come into work and my keyboard at my desk is all uneven and I lift it up and there are a bunch of Reese’s under neath for me. ;)</p>
<p>I do like to “celebrate” V-Day, but in a simple way. A meal everyone likes, small gifts for the kids and a special decadent dessert for everyone to enjoy.</p>
<p>When we were poor, starving grad students, DH & I set a $5 limit on V-day gifts. The first year, he gave me a small pot of mini daffodils. It warmed my heart to see those cheerful yellow flowers in a gloomy Pittsburgh winter. (Those of you from Pgh know very well how gray & gloomy Pgh winters can be). I gave him a bottle of beer, some cheese & bread. We had an indoor picnic with the goodies, graced by flowers on the table.</p>
<p>The $5 limit has stood for ~25 years. It takes effort & creativity to come up with something decent for $5. Some years are good; some years, not so much. </p>
<p>Good: he gave me a dozen red roses. I thought he had robbed the local cemetery but it turns out that a grocery store had a $5 special on roses.</p>
<p>Good: I bought a $5 bottle of champagne, hid it inside a snowman (which also chilled it), then left scavenger hunt clues around the house. Bad: he came home from work exhausted at 9:30 pm. The mood was not-so-romantic by then.</p>
<p>Bad: the year he gave me a card that read “Let me call you ‘Sweetheart’ because I can’t remember your name.” The Hershey’s chocolate bar was also a flop.</p>
<p>But now I’m ready to let go of the $5 tradition after ~25 years. After all, it hasn’t been indexed for inflation.</p>
<p>I think there is something fun about rituals and traditions, but that doesn’t mean you have to do them on someone else’s schedule. My husband has been making waffle breakfast on the weekend since grad school. We have a tradition of buying something together for our anniversary instead of buying something for each other. Usually it’s art work, but this year we got new everyday china. (This stuff <a href=“http://www.kscopepottery.com/130-3081_IMG.JPG[/url]”>http://www.kscopepottery.com/130-3081_IMG.JPG</a> and it’s making me happy every day.) When the kids were smaller we had small glass stars that we hung from our chandelier one at a time as a countdown to Christmas.</p>
<p>My ex-H used to make me homemade pizza every year on Valentine’s, and he individually cut each pepperoni slice into a heart. Yeah, ohhhh. That was good. Unfortunately, he had a few other bad traits, like girlfriends.</p>
<p>Current H buys over-priced roses at the grocery and complains about their cost. Signs his cards with first <em>and</em> last name. Like I might forget his name? Are romantic guys only in the movies?</p>
<p>sry, my BF used to be a chef at a restaurant and he makes delicious home made pizza. Sooooooo good. He makes the dough and the sauce from scratch. I’m amazed he hasn’t bought a cow to make his own cheese, lol.</p>
<p>I had an ex who bought me a rose every week. I don’t even like them much. They die so quickly. As soon as it died, he’d replace it with a new rose. It was cute at first, but considering he gave me one like a week before he broke up with me, not very sincere!! I told current BF before we were even dating how I never want to see another rose again!</p>
<p>One of the things I got for my birthday was a super soft cover for the steering wheel in my car. It was so funny… he was so excited by his gift. I had just opened it and he goes LETS GO PUT IT ON!!! and he’s outside in his pajamas in the freezing cold putting this thing in my car. I asked what made you decide to get me that and he says “that way when you get in your car in the morning your cute little hands will be kept warm and every time you will think of my gift warming them.” What a dork.</p>
<p>S1 was born on Valentine’s day. After that Feb. 14th revolved around sleepovers, pizzas,movies, eating at Taco Bell (his fav. restaurant when he was ten).<br>
He’s an adult out on his own now. Maybe we’ll have to think of a new Valentine’s Day tradition.</p>
<p>I chuckle whenever I remember the year that DS1 signed his first and last names on a birthday card for my mother. Not sure that I’d chuckle if my DH did it to me.</p>
<p>The weekend closest to Valentines Day is the only night of the year that we go out to eat. We make it a point to have as many romantic evenings as possible, but that’s the one time we actually get dressed up and go through all the motions of going out on a date. For other holidays we make dinner together and plan a romantic evening at home, but for some reason we go all out for V day. We only do gifts for birthdays and christmas.</p>
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