Pam's Week 6: Love is All Around Me

To quote one of my favourite Christmas movies, "Whenever I get gloomy with the state of the world, I think about the arrivals gate at Heathrow Airport. General opinion’s starting to make out that we live in a world of hatred and greed, but I don’t see that. It seems to me that love is everywhere. Often, it’s not particularly dignified or newsworthy, but it’s always there – fathers and sons, mothers and daughters, husbands and wives, boyfriends, girlfriends, old friends. When the planes hit the Twin Towers, as far as I know, none of the phone calls from the people on board were messages of hate or revenge – they were all messages of love. If you look for it, I’ve got a sneaky feeling you’ll find that love actually is all around." Does anyone know what it is? Prizes for the first correct answer! Just kidding, I will just clap for you.

Anyways, when Sharon and I were on our way to bookclub Monday night and she asked me what word I was planning to explore visually, I had to ask her what that actually meant. She suggested that I use the word "love" since it was her first choice until she settled on "winter" instead (which she did a phenomenal job exploring if you ask me). She gave me some examples, which I didn't actually use, relying instead on my other good friends Google and Pinterest.

Now, I am happily married, most of the time, and have 2 kids I adore, most of the time. This doesn't automatically make me a fan of Valentine's Day. I prefer it over the Hallmark Holiday of "Sweetest Day" or something like that in November (I'd never heard of it until I lived in Michigan) as there is some history there but it's still way over-commercialized and a little silly. Honestly, if we truly loved people, shouldn't we be showing them that every day and celebrating our relationships 365 days a year? If Valentine's Day is the only day you're going to be nice to me, don't bother is my theory. Having said that, I now look like a hypocrite as you'll see that we did celebrate it this year and we often do as my husband is a little romantic and the kids get all excited about it, but I think we're nice to each other on other days as well.


We'll begin with the food-related "love".....


A Valentine's Meringue Dessert - last Saturday evening, we had a couple's dinner with some friends. My contribution was dessert so I made this fancy concoction. I had to make 2 meringues as the first one was flat and round instead of fluffy and heart-shaped. It was worth the effort though - delightful!

Cinnamon Hearts - one of my favourite Valentine treats....

We'll give props to Google for this idea - they did it with cranberries but we had cinnamon hearts in our house....

Cinnamon Hearts Popcorn - don't knock it 'til you try it!  I was searching on Pinterest for ways to use up the cinnamon hearts we've had in the cupboard for far too long and voila!  

I arrived home from work last night to an amazingly yummy smelling house and to the dining room table set for a special dinner.  Since we had to drop Duncan off at his first Cubs campout last night, Robert decided we should have a special family Valentine's dinner last night.  He made baked lemon chicken, bacon-wrapped parmesan asparagus and coconut rice with cranberries.  It was fantastic!

 Strawberry Valentine Rolls - I meant to make these last night so that Robert could partake before heading to work this morning, but it didn't happen.  Instead, Danica and I shared them this morning and left some for a treat for Robert later.

And now for some Bookish "Love"....

I must thank Google images for these next few photos. Unfortunately, I wasn't able to completely replicate the photos as I could not figure out how to get the ring to stand up without tape and I wasn't able to keep the tape from showing but you get the idea....

The Greatest Love Story of All Time....

So, the book is "Romeo and Juliet" which is rather self-explanatory. It's an ancient copy that once belonged to one of my grandparents. The ring belonged to my Granny Duncan. She passed away when I was 4 but when I was 16, I decided I wanted to talk to my grandfather about her. The story he told me amazes me today. He recalled, in vivid detail, how nervous he was on their wedding day and how terrified he was that he'd drop her ring down the heating vent that was at the front of the church. He recounted how they couldn't afford gifts one Christmas so she wrote him a letter that he still carried in his wallet. He showed me her makeup and hairbrush that remained in the dresser drawers where she'd left them 12 years earlier. Telling me the stories brought tears to his eyes.

After helping me with the lighting for the first photo, Duncan picked up a Crayola lightwriter from one of his lightwriting sets and used it to cast a blue-purple glow over the image.  I like it too.

This is also a photo courtesy of Google Images....This time I used the copy of "Gone with the Wind" that once belonged to my Granny Duncan.

Finally, miscellaneous "love"....

Robert and I made our own wedding invitations and I discovered this stamp that we still had lying around.

The goal was a silhouette in front of a sunset but it was too early for the right sunset and too cold to wait around...

Duncan then insisted I take a photo of this "heart" he noticed in the snowbank of plowed snow...

I also had a photo of Danica writing her Valentine's but Blogger apparently feels I've already monopolized too much of your time and does not want me to include it. It didn't upload during my first attempt and won't even give me the option now. Oh well.


So, as you can see, love is all around me. I hope it's also all around you this Valentine's Day (and every day, for that matter). Happy Valentine's Day!