Its All About Love

I have always been a bit of a "scrooge" about Valentines Day. I never really saw the reason for celebrating it. Last year was the first year I really put up decorations, and that was mainly for my daughters birthday (she was born on the 16th).
This year I decided that love is always a reason to celebrate. So for the month leading up to Valentines Day I am going to go through 1 Corinthians 13 with myself, and my children and talk about the real meaning of love.
I also started putting some little decorations up around my house. Last spring I found a cute Easter tree at Hobby Lobby. I took the eggs off and added some cute heart conversation ornaments to it.

By my back door I hung a little strand of hearts I made. I got the inspiration from pinterest and just used some scrapbooking paper I can laying aroudnd.

My front two windows are decorated with a heart garland I put together last year.

My son wrote a poem a few weeks ago that ties in what I am feeling about this season so well.
"Love is an important thing.
It makes us want to sing.
God loves us from above
So the most important thing is love."

Tradtions

As I have gotten older I am more thankful for traditions. This time of the year makes me think through them. In my family growing up, every Christmas Eve we went down to Union Station in DC to look at the Christmas decorations and then after dinner would drive around and look at lights. And then because of allergies we had a "fake" tree, and it was always fun trying to figure out the branches!
I have enjoyed starting traditions with my family as well. Being military, you move around alot, and last year I loved being able to take our kids to get a Christmas tree at the same place we did the year before. It is a nice luxury to go back to the familiar.
Last year my friends and I discovered the most awesome pumpkin patch! We spend the whole day there and wore all the kids out.

This is a picture of my kiddos last year at the patch

This is a picture of them this year....lots of changes!!! (including being alot harder to pose this year as they are both so mobile!)
We added a few new friends this year. One thing about being in the military is that your "family" is always flexible. Some years we may have 5 families going, the next year 15.
I love traditions. They are so special. I am treasuring these times with my kids because I know before long they are going to be grown up and making traditions of their own.