Happy Valentines Day 2025 - 2025/02/14

Happy Valentines Day! It's a day where we get to show our love and affection to the people we care about in our lives! 

In years past, we've gone to Disney World to pass out valentines treats to all the cast members we saw, but this year we've let our annual passes expire and can't do that. We've got some other fun plans though. 

Alli and Ian are all dressed up for the day. The night before, they put together valentines treats bags for all their school classmates with Nerds, Gummy Bears, Skittles and more. 

I had told Theresa a few days earlier that after dropping the kids off at school, I'd be taking her to a nice pastry place. But, after sending the kids off, I realized that that's not really Theresa's style. She'd much rather have fresh bread than a fancy pastry. Want to go get bagels? 

Theresa - Yes! 

And wouldn't you know it, Einstein Brothers has bagels today that are shaped just like a heart! And in Chocolate Chip, her favorite flavor!  

It was a very nice surprise and made both of us smile. 

Instead of doing a big valentines thing at Disney World, Theresa and I suggested we could do something big at Alli and Ian's school instead. At noon, we walked in with 8 pizzas, 4 orders of breadsticks, and 4 orders of cinnamon bites. It's a Valentines Day Pizza Party! Twice the kids got really big THANK YOUs from the whole class. Theresa and I hung out for a few minutes while everyone was getting pizzas and within 10 minutes most everything was GONE! Kids (and teachers) love pizza! 

Our new car for getting around is a Prius Hybrid, which has an added benefit of having a 120V outlet in the trunk! Along with a mini-fridge, we've also put a microwave back there! So, even when the kids get finished with school at 6:30pm, we can heat up a healthy meal to eat while we drive an hour back home. No worries about this not being a special Valentines meal tonight. I've got something in mind for tomorrow instead. 

At home, Alli brought out everyone some homemade cards she had made. 

Ian's is a special golden color, because that's his favorite color. 

The inside of my card. 

And I thought she did an extra special job with Theresa's card. Love the creativity! 

And about that special Valentines meal? It's been a while since I've made fried chicken at home. Normally we'd make Grammy's recipe, but as I was watching YouTube, I came across a video where someone put a lot of effort into getting the flavor of Chick-fil-A correct. 

The day before I started brining the chicken tenders, and for dinner, I mixed them in a special coating and they tasted great! Better than Chick-fil-A the kids and Theresa said. I'll definitely be making this one again, but I'll add maybe 1.5x the spices. I was definitely getting Chick-fil-A vibes from it, but only in certain bites. Maybe more spices will spread that out even more. Either way, it was delicious! 

Here's what I followed to get these.