Valentine's Day

Yup, I got a little bit behind. I didn't get great pics of the kiddos for Valentine's Day. They haven't been too cooperative with our Photo shoots lately. You can't really see it, but I put felt hearts as button covers on Ella's dress. I've wanted to do that for V-Day ever since I saw this Martha idea years ago, but felt too silly to do it on myself. Glad to have a little girl as my cutesy guinea pig!
I tried out doing a Valentine's Day "Love" banner on burlap instead of felt. (I'm kind of loving burlap lately. It's really cheap, too!) This one frayed before I realized I could seal the edges with white glue.) Here's a felt one I made for some friends that moved away (Sniff.) with the message "We'll 'OWL'ways love you!"
We ended up having to babysit pretty early that morning, so we opted to have our Valentine's Breakfast for Dinner instead. Chocolate Heart Shaped Pancakes with Fresh Strawberry Sauce. I'll skip the chocolate pancakes next year (kinda bland), but here's the recipe for the Strawberry Sauce from the "Our Best Bites" Blog on my sidebar.


Strawberry Sauce

1 pint strawberries

1/3 c. white sugar

1 tsp. almond extract (my favorite) or vanilla extract

Wash strawberries and remove stems. If you’re feeling ambitious, you can roughly chop the berries, but I say you’re already feeling ambitious enough by making your own strawberry sauce. So don’t sweat it.

Combine berries, sugar, and extract in medium saucepan and bring to a simmer over medium heat. Cook for five minutes, stirring/breaking strawberries up with a wooden spoon constantly.

After five minutes, remove from heat and allow to cool slightly (if you have a glass blender jar) and a lot (if you have a plastic blender jar). When cool enough, transfer mixture to blender and pulse until desired consistency is reached.