How to spend THAT day.
Twitter has been alive today with love and hate for Valentine’s Day. What a weird day this always is. So much pressure around it. Even our 5YO came home asking questions about it last week and burst into tears all of a sudden. I finally coaxed out of him that he was expecting it to be like his birthday or Christmas, and he was just really disappointed that it wasn’t going to be that sort of fanfare and gift giving.
We talked for a long time about that. It bothers me that there’s a huge expectation around a made-up day. What happened to a little cheesy card with some marshmallowy candy hearts?
Speaking of cards, check out the boys’ cards. Aren’t they the cutest?!
While I would just be peachy-keen for you to think of me as brilliant and creative beyond all measure, there are lots of freebies out there to help make cards likes these. These in particular were posted by Florabella (she has holiday card templates, as well), and were just about the sweetest things. The Goldfish most likely will but the nix on these kind of cards within a couple of years, but until then, his handsome little face will be on every stinkin’ cute card template I can find.
Swoon.
And speaking of cards and handsome little faces on them, I’m tossing around the idea of offering photography mini-sessions for Valentine’s Day cards and the like for next year. What do you think? I think it could be just loads of fun and it would give me the opportunity to bounce around and be goofy with somebody else’s kids for a bit.
Also speaking of photography, my amazing web guy will be revamping this site soon to include my photography site, as well as my yoga one. Isn’t that exciting?! I’ll be updating it over the coming weeks to highlight the holiday sessions from 2010. Can’t wait to post little stories about those beautiful families here.
But back to how we spent today. I just can’t think of a better way to spend today, or any day for that matter, than with my family. We packed ourselves into a small cafe in Dillon this morning for omelets and pancakes. And coloring. Lots of coloring.
We happened to get the best spot in the joint. A sunny corner in the back, just where the floor really starts its downward slope, right under the roll out windows with broken hardware and some cow salt and pepper shakers.
I have a thing for quirky salt and pepper shakers. It’s weird. We don’t even have a normal matching set, but I always get a kick out of ones like these. They’re sooooo not my style, either, but they make me terribly happy. How could you not crack a smile if you reached for those to jazz up your breakfast creations? Gosh. They almost make me snort.
The sunlight in that little corner was divine. There’s just something delicious about it hitting your back while you watch your kids try to pour syrup on the butter dish and steal your coffee.
The ambience was quite complete with a couple carnations. I’m sure they were to celebrate this day. This very normal day.
Hank and I sat just watching and listening while the kids colored and tried to catch the ice in our water glasses with their spoons. And while we sat, we eavesdropped on the tables right next to us about what it used to be like up in the mountains. Back in the ’60s. Before they flooded the valley and made the reservoir; before they moved that very cafe up from the lowerlands; before there were easy ways to get up here. Back when Oh My God road was the road most travelled, and the road most treacherous. Back when Keystone was the first ski area in Colorado to have a gondola, and they had only one, and it was on their logo. There was an old gentleman there passing along his experience of it all to a young woman. Don’t know who she was to him, but they seemed related, and she seemed in love with the mountain and hung on his words like nectar on a flower.
It was lovely.
And then, the cook came out to tell stories to the locals next to us of how marriages were against the law in the military at one time, and there was a famous priest who used to marry couples covertly, just for Valentine’s Day. I wish I would have listened more to those stories, because I just got tidbits here and there.
But that was all I meant to hear, I suppose, because right then our breakfast came and our boys attacked. The Goldfish made some creation on his flapjacks that included a scoop of butter, a package each of orange marmalade, apple butter, and honey, then topped it with just a splash of syrup.
He said that they were the best pancakes he’d ever had.
And darn it all, I bet they were.
