The other day my husband was wrapping up a meeting and the person leading it tried to schedule the next one. He looked at his calendar and said. “Oh, two weeks would be February 14th, does anyone actually do anything for Valentines Day?” And my husband was like “yes, I do, I am unavailable on Valentine’s Day.” He got off the call and told me about it with incredulity. “Do people not celebrate Valentine’s Day?” he asked. “it’s one of my favorite holidays.”
Now, I am a huge fan of all holidays and we celebrate basically everything, but we stumbled on this little tradition a few years back that we really enjoy. I should probably say that usually my husband follow strict diets January-February and Valentine’s Day is our first cheat day, so that probably is a piece of why it’s so fun to us. 🙂
On the other hand, we don’t want to go too crazy so we usually eat spa-type food for dinner that night that we make ourselves. Usually spring rolls because we can make them together and they’re a little bit special and delicious. Look up rainbow spring rolls on Pinterest to find a recipe. We feed our kids something easy and put them to bed early. Now that they’re getting older they have a slumber party together and watch a show until it’s late enough to fall asleep. They do not watch romantic things. They hate romantic things. And kissing. They hate kissing.
The Chocolate Box Tradition
You’ll need a box of chocolates. Years ago I would get a cheap Russell Stover-type one from the grocery store. Now I go to a nice local chocolate shop and get some fancy chocolates.
I open up the chocolates ahead of time and hide a tiny piece of paper with an activity written on it under each one. Here is a free printable for you, but you can really just write your own things down on paper. Choose things that you and your spouse love to do together. One of our favorite things is watching Valentines Day episodes of our favorite sitcoms. We also lean in to the spa night theme with pedicures, facials and massages.
We make strawberry and mint infused water, light all the candles we own and turn on my Valentine’s Day playlist. No phones allowed. A lot of times we don’t get through all the chocolates so we save the rest of the box to do another night. It’s such a great night, we end up feeling indulged and connected really connected with each other. And it so easy to throw together.
Please let me know if you try it!
