nor the Vermont Teddy Bear, jewelry, or flowers. Was I disappointed? Well, kind of. I mean aren't you curious about the 'sexy' part of the 'sweet and sexy' valentine package?
Instead, this is what my Valentine's weekend looked like:
It started with a Little Britches moment. (Did you ever read that book? Well you should. -You did? Then you should read it again. It's that good.)
Cache came in early and said, "Do we have plans today? If not, Calder, Maddie and I want to go junking before the snakes come out."
I was unclear what 'junking' was.
He informed me that, as a bank teller, he gets lots of ideas on how to make extra spending money from people that come to cash their checks. Ways that seem much faster, more lucrative, and a little more age appropriate than the lemonade stands he's outgrown.
One of those ways is to 'junk'.
A certain gentleman goes to the scrap yard each week taking a load of old metal from wherever he can find it. Then he brings his check to the bank to be cashed.
Wallah!
Suddenly, Cache and Calder were no longer irritated with the previous owner of our property and his penchant for turning various washes into junkyards. The old adage, 'one man's junk is another man's treasure' seemed to be a true statement, and armed with no more information than that, they set out to recruit their workers.
Just two hours later, high hopes and load after load had been transferred from one spot to the other.
Meanwhile Bert and I watched on, somewhat dubiously.
I mean, besides pop cans being recycled, weren't scrap metal drives just a patriotic movement of WWII? Could they really still be paying for it? Would it be worth the effort? Where would they take it? Did it have to be a certain kind? Would they take anything? Who, exactly, is they? Could you just drive in and dump? And most importantly; why did all of this enterprising spirit have to skip mine and Bert's generation?! Couldn't the kids, and their grandparents have shared even just a toenail of it with the parents?
Obviously not.
But, I'm sure we can be content just basking in their light.
Because, it's a pretty big light.
And Wallah! all things worked in their favor.
I LOVE THESE KIDS!
My favorite part of the whole thing? When Maddie saved back some bed springs to make a pair of moon shoes.
Did I mention, I LOVE THESE KIDS?!
Next up for the romantic weekend were the horses.
Jesse drew the shots,
Calder, Hy, Pal, and I lent our presence,
Cache was the muscle,
Maddie was the entertainment,
and Bert was the talent.
With horses and junking done, we moved on to firing, and tilling the garden.
-or Bert did.
I LOVE THAT MAN!
With that out of the way...Calder was able to talk Pal into helping him earn a scouting merit badge.
The ice cold water was no deterrent.
In Calder's words, "This is stupid! I'm not going to wait four whole months to advance just because of a little cold water!"
Hilarious!Again, I LOVE THESE KIDS!
And the Love didn't end there.
It just spilled over into Sunday.
We had the missionaries over, and while Bert made stir-fry, the rest of us made sushi rolls.
Impressive, eh?
We capped it off with the kids' new and improved version of Tug of War.
And, dare I say it again?
If I don't, who will?
Besides. It is, after all, Valentines.
I LOVE THIS FAMILY!
No footies necessary- sexy or otherwise.
