Valentine's Day should be every day

Happy Valentine's Day! I had so much fun with this holiday as a kid. Exchanging valentines at school, wearing red, and having our traditional Valentine's meal where my mom dyed the potatoes and applesauce red and made red Jell-o, red velvet cake, and red sugar cookies for dessert. (We take our holidays seriously.) It's still a fun holiday for me as an adult. I love to decorate for holidays! But Valentine's Day can also be annoying and sometimes ridiculous.

The front cover of all the local department store fliers have been identical for the past week or so with half of the page devoted to jewelry and the other portion showing lingerie. I find this highly amusing that men are expected to buy some bling and women are supposed to put on something sexy for their men. For one thing, I don't like anyone telling me how to celebrate my holidays. Fine jewelery is not something practical at this point in my life. Where would I wear my new diamond earrings and necklace? To the bathroom? That's the only place I could keep away from my sweet little one year old's grabby hands. And if I wear lingerie on V-Day, does that mean I can be a witch to my husband the rest of the year since I did my part for the holiday? Not to mention all the pressure put on men to "get it right". Don't mess up Valentine's Day or you are in the dog house. Forget what good you may do and how you show your love the other 364 days of the year. This is the only day that matters!

I have no problem celebrating Valentine's Day. I am all for being cute and romantic. But I do think this "celebration of love" (gag) should be a regular occurrence. You better not be saving up your little random acts of kindness, tender words, love notes, etc. only for this one day or else you will have one very love starved relationship. I think it's more meaningful when someone does something sweet when they are not told to and it is not expected of them. For instance, a few weeks ago my husband wrote "I love you" in the dirt on my van window. Way romantic you say, right? I do! How sweet to know he was thinking of me and wanting to write it. Or what about when he sings love songs to me while helping me clean. Totally priceless. The list could go on and on. We don't need a holiday to remind us to be nice and show love to each other, we already do that all the time. It's those little moments of thoughtfulness that feed a marriageand make a happy and healthy relationship.

Have fun on Valentine's Day! Wear red, eat chocolate, or do whatever it is you do. But remember that really loving and caring about someone is something you should show more than just once a year.

To give or not to give?

As I finished up shopping and was getting into my van with my five year old daughter, a man on a bicycle approached me. He looked as if he hadn't showered in days, with a thick coating of dirt and grime all over. He asked me for some spare change, claiming to need $6 more in order to get a hotel room. I had $9 left and gave it all to him. Then he told me "God bless" and went on his way, hopefully to the hotel.

I haven't had an experience like that in years and ended up reflecting on my philosophy class I took at Temple University. One day we had a heated debated on this very subject, offering money to someone on the street. Should you do it? Some were of the opinion that you shouldn't because you don't know what the person is going to use the money for. What if they are lying to you and end up using it to buy booze or drugs? What if you end up indirectly helping them feed their addictions? Are you just as bad as they are? It'd be better to give to a charity than to do a hand-out on the street because that way you know where your money is going.

Another group voiced that you should give money to the person on the street. Giving to a charity is great, but what about the man right in front of you? It is your choice to give him the money or not. By giving the money you are doing your part and your conscience is clear. And that is where your control of the situation ends. You have no power over what that person does with the money. But you've done your part. That person has the choice to buy a hot meal or hotel room or drugs, alcohol, etc. What the man does with the money is on his head, not on yours. So give.

I agree with the latter group. It did me no harm to give that man my $9 change. Obviously something compelled him to have the need to ask for the money. Judging by his looks, times were tough. If it was a scam, so be it. He can do with my money as he pleases. I hope he chooses to do something good and useful with it. But I know I did my part and my conscience is clear.

Sometimes I think we, as a society, think too much. It would do us good to have some more mercy and compassion towards our fellowman rather than immediately judging and condemning them.

Now He Cares

A few weeks ago I had the pleasure of being alone in the car and listening to NPR, which made me feel smart to be able to learn a thing or two about what is going on in the world. As chance would have it, I had the wonderful opportunity to listen to a voice on the radio that makes me cringe because the man behind it has yet to do any good and has far too much power. Yes, dear friends, it was the voice of our beloved President Obama.

Thankfully it was a re-cap of his latest speech concerning the economy. I was glad to not be forced to listen to his entire magical presentation of malarkey. What I did hear made me laugh out of the pure irony of it all. President Obama was talking about our national debt and how we were all "in it together" and needed to pull together to get through this time and make things right again. In other words, don't hate him for driving our nation deeper into debt and accept that the spending spree isn't over.

I had to laugh because I didn't know we were all in this together. Really? You mean I had a choice when the government was writing checks faster than the speed of light? How silly of me not to know that! It seemed more to me like someone just snuck into my house one night and decided to have a party with my bank account. Not literally, mind you, but we'll have to pay for the careless government spending some day. If not us, then our children. And now that times are still tough despite all the dollars spent, it's up to me and everyone else to be strong and pull through? Right, because we weren't doing that before. I don't think so. Perhaps Mr. President should have thought about us little people before handing out cash faster than the strip club card dispensers in Vegas. We've been suffering all along so don't pretend like you're one of us because your little plan failed and people hate you.

But since we are all in this together, maybe President Obama will let me use Air Force One to take my honey to a Broadway show this weekend for Valentine's Day. No prob, right?

Best Disneyland Trip

We're back and had the best Disneyland trip ever! It was our third time going and the best for smaller crowds. We had a blast!

We arrived to California on Wednesday afternoon and took the kids to the beach, which is only 25 minutes from Disneyland. They had never been to the beach and thought it was great. Everyone got soaked jumping in the waves. Jimmy did get knocked down by a wave and refused tog o near the water after that, but he still had fun playing in the sand and collecting shells. We headed to our hotel wet, sandy, and happy.

Thursday was our best day at Disneyland and California Adventure because there was no rain. We got to go on everything we wanted to in Disneyland and so were able to head over to California Adventure that afternoon. Jimmy got to get his picture with Lightening McQueen, which was like the coolest thing ever. We all went to bed tired and happy.

Friday we had a constant drizzle all day, but that didn't stop us. We donned our ponchos and still had a blast on all the rides. No big crowds again! We did go to see the "Aladdin" show, which was pretty awesome and entertaining. And we did the Princess Walk thanks to no lines. Anna got her picture taken with three princesses. She was very excited!

Saturday was our last day and it started out with rain, but then cleared up by the time we got to the park. We all had fun hitting our favorite rides one last time. Jimmy and Anna were big fans of the Tower of Terror, which was surprising. Rachel loved Pinocchio and we all loved the new Toy Story Carnival ride and Soarin' Over California. By noon we were ready to head for home.

Darci, our adopted Grandma from our ward, took Jacob while we were on vacation, so it made life so much easier by not having to deal with a baby/toddler. He had a great time being spoiled by her and her husband, but by the end he was wondering when, and if ever, we were coming back. I really missed him too and was very excited to be reunited with him on Saturday night.

Best Disneyland trip ever!
Sitting with Dad and a seagull after getting knocked down by a wave.
Running from the waves.
Teacups with Dad. Go Dad!
Rachel on King Arthur's Carousel.
Jimmy and Lightening McQueen. What is cooler than that?
Anna and Princess Tiana. She also got to take pictures with Belle and Ariel. Rachel and Jimmy were too shy.
Rain can't stop us from having fun!