We didn't celebrate Valentines Day the "typical way"

It's that day again, February 14, the oh so romantic, Valentine's Day...but is it really "romantic"? 

For me this year, the weeks and days leading up to it, I began feeling this little stir to shake things up. I began seeing all of my single friends preparing themselves for this day in which they are reminded by the whole world that they don't have a "significant other" and I began seeing a lot of my female friends in relationships joking about dropping hints to their loved one about what they wanted. 

And it hit me like a baseball to the face at an Orioles game--Valentine's Day kind of sets people up for failure! 

It sets single women and men up to be bitter towards those in realtionships, and it sets those in relationships up to have such unrealistic expectations for what they will "get" from the one they "love". 

I mean, Christmas was a little over a month ago, we all have birthdays each year, and yet there is this day set aside when we are supposed to "love" one another? It seemed crazy to me this year! 

It seemed crazy to me to look at the flower prices, that are seriously DOUBLED on this 1 day, the chocolates, the presents, the cards, etc and so forth. 

It all was too much for me this year. 

I tried researching how the day started, and that brought about as much confusion as I was already experiencing. Some says it's a Christian day, representing some saint who saved people. Some say it's a pagan day representing a bloody massacre. 

But what did I feel? 

What did God feel? 

I immediately began feeling that this one day is absurd! I should be truly, genuinely loving people, my husband and children, EVERY DAY, not only on Valentine's Day. I didn't want Brian to go out on this one day and spend an absurd amount of money buying me something. I didn't want to "want" something only to be upset with Him because he didn't do as good of a job as I had hoped. I didn't want to compare him to other husbands, saying why can't you be more romantic like so and so (I honestly don't feel these things, but I COULD have and I know some who DO).

I wanted to release him from ALL of MY expectations. 

So, this year, we both agreed to get each other NOTHING, (he did MAKE me a card, because well he rocks), and instead we decided that he would have a romantic dinner with our girls and I would have a romantic dinner with our boys. 

And we did it UP! 

We bought candles, laid the nice tablecloths out, used the fine china, we got dressed up in nice clothes and we just enjoyed about 40 minutes with the ones who we are teaching to love. 

We focused on them. 

He talked with the girls about what they should expect from men when they are older, and I talked with the boys about what they should expect from ladies when they are older. 

Jaxson would like to take his future girlfriend to the zoo, and Jordon hopes his future girlfriend can stand up for herself and not expect him to because he's not good at that sort of thing (according to him of course). Hayley would like to have 2 kids and live in a house like ours. 

We ate pizza that we designed ourselves, and drank out of wine glasses. And at the end, Jordon asked if we could do this every year, "you know, start a tradition". 

And oh my momma heart jumped for joy. 

You got it buddy! You got it! 

So, we transformed a day that is supposed to be about flowers and candies for the one you love, and truly focused on the ones we loved! Really, we didn't do a lot differently except took ourselves out of the equation and focused on others! 

It. Was. Amazing.