love boxes

Valentine's day the girls left for school smiling about their creations. 

Grandma Martha and I took Sophie and our little men out to lunch at Carl's, because Grant loves to jump through the shark's teeth in the playzone. Then I dropped the group off at home, and drove to the elementary school, marveling at the day's perfection.  

The grey skies had given way to brilliant blue and sun-- creating thin silver shadows on the crusty patches of snow, as the tree branches stretched out in proud, bare, elegance. I noticed that muddy brown earth was beginning to appear in odd shaped circles around the warmth of tree trunk and root, and the evidence of a hundred twisting paths and a thousand steps in January could be observed melting into too long ago to remember.

And while the teenagers had groused traditionally about Valentines--facing the prospect of the potential mentioning of the holiday at school with obligatory annoyance, the elementary school was all 1979 and I was eight again when I saw the parking lot filled with mini-vans and moms carrying sheets of cupcakes veiled in foil.

I had signed up to help in Mary's classroom.

As I have mentioned before, Mary and her teacher are both from Hong Kong. I had a happy Asian moment  when Mary's teacher asked me to serve the pizza--with a chopstick.  Caucasian means uncoordinated.

In the evening we made homemade heart-shaped pizza.  Sam's dough was especially delicious!

 For desert I passed out little heart shaped boxes of cheap chocolates filled with bright pink and orange flavored goo.  Grandma Martha said it was the most fun she'd ever had on Valentine's Day, and I agreed.