Printable Valentines and Valentine-y Baking

I love baking with the kids. Its fun for them, but its also a whole lot of fun for me - I enjoy explaining to them what each ingredient does, and math is more fun when it has a practical application. Plus, the girls get goofy and brave about wanting to try every ingredient. I warn them, "Baking soda doesn't taste good!" But they try it anyway, which is quite remarkable to me, and we have fun conversations about how each ingredient plays a different role. I reward them with a large chunk of brown sugar - and, of course, a finished cookie, too.

And I think the fact that I genuinely enjoy that time together means something to them. They can tell when I'm having fun, and it makes a difference. It's something to be remember as a parent. Anytime we're having a rough day, "Let's make cupcakes!" quickly turns things around for all of us.

So I decided to make some fun baking themed Valentines, in honor of our baking time and our love of chocolate... and okay, my love of puns, too. They're pretty bad, but oh so good, too. Here they are:

Cookie cutter: I ❤ you.
Cupcake: Be my cupcake.
Donut: I like you a hole lot.
Cookie: You're one smart cookie.
Brownie: You scored some brownie points.
Lollipops: I'm a sucker for you.

All six valentines fit on one page. The pdf includes both a color and a black/white version in case you'd like to color them yourself. Printing on card stock will make them more like store bought valentines. Just, cut them out, and write a note on the back. Of course, they'd go nicely tucked into a basket of cookies, but that's up to you. :) Download the Valentine's here.
Update: Cards have been updated and can now be found in my shop. 

I'll be coloring some with the girls and try to get some in the mail in the next week. Looks like I'll be explaining puns to them, too - that should be fun!

Happy Valentine's Day, everyone. I think you're all smart cookies.

Check out my other valentines: print and draw valentines

Wendy Wilson and Dog Toys

We got a new puppy this past fall. She is quickly finding her place here, as if she was always meant to be. I'm not exactly a dog person - I've had to learn how to train here. But I'm glad I did.

She is all puppy now, and chews on everything she can get her teeth on, including the bucket full of stuffed animals the girls have. So I decided to make her a quick stuffed toy or two. I made it from two layers of sturdy canvas, hoping it would last a little while. I just folded it over and zig zagged around the edges. Plus, I tucked a treat inside the stuffing, hoping she'd smell it and go for this toy over the kids' animals.

So far, she hasn't broken through it yet to get the treat - which I'm actually kind of surprised about. Maybe one layer of canvas was enough? I don't know how long the treat inside will stay good, so I was hoping she'd tear into it in just a few days. We'll see.  

How can you say know to that face? Anybody know how long the chewy puppy stage lasts?

Chicken Love

We've had chickens for many years now, but mostly they're John's chickens. I like to watch them, and occasionally throw some corn at them, and (of course) eat the eggs. But John has always been the one who takes care of them. 

But this winter, I was home without him for about a week, and so, for the first time, I took charge of the daily chicken chores: feeding them, letting them out, collecting and washing the eggs, locking them up each night, and with the freezing temperatures, replacing the frozen water in their jug each day. 

Each morning, they clucked wildly around their frozen water dish until I came to replace it. And when I let them out of the hen house, they charged me like a pack of feathery velociraptors hungry for cracked corn. At night, I'd slog out through the dark and the freezing mud to lock them in away from predators. I woke up in the night to google chickens in freezing temperatures to make sure they'd be okay.

These aren't difficult chores, but they are absolutely vital to the dear little chickens. And there is a rhythm to these chores, that settles you and softens you, and re-connects you to the external world that central-heat-and-air so often hides from us. I have been grateful that John did all the work... but now I wonder if I wasn't missing out on something?

Love begets love, and today I love these chickens.

Happy New Year!

The holidays are so often a rush and a whisper - a whirlwind of busy-ness and a call to peacefulness.  Ours has been a bit paradoxical, both lovely and lonely. And I am eager to hold on to the lingering lovely moments that we have before our routine returns, to hold on to them and plant them into our routine.

I made an absolutely beautiful loaf of bread, but didn't bother to photograph it until it was almost gone. Yet, its beauty persists each morning as we eat another toasted slice. 

And despite our abnormal schedule and irregular appointments, we are still pouring two cups of coffee each morning and washing the dishes [most days]. This is beautiful, too. This is life and it persists despite our disrupted routines.

I have no idea what is in store this year, what projects we will undertake, what joys and tragedies we will face, but I am going in with my eyes wide open. I am determined to make this a year of love and not argument. I am looking and looking. Wishing you much love and beauty this year!

"Unless we look at a person and see the beauty there is in this person, we can contribute nothing to him. One does not help a person by discerning what is wrong, what is ugly, what is distorted. Christ looked at everyone he met, at the prostitute, at the thief, and saw the beauty hidden there. Perhaps it was distorted, perhaps damaged, but it was beauty none the less, and what he did was to call out this beauty... 

And this is what we must learn to do with regard to each person as an individual, but also - and this is not always as easy - with regard to groups of people or a nation. We must learn to look, and look until we have seen the underlying beauty of this group of people. 

Only then can we even begin to do something to call out all the beauty that is there. 

Listen to other people, and whenever you discern something which sounds true, which is a revelation of harmony and beauty, emphasize it and help it to flower. Strengthen it and encourage it to live." - Met. Anthony Bloom