The Value of Valentines

 

Autumn and Alaina working hard on their Valentines.

Getting ready to head out the door with our loot of Valentines and cookies!

 Yesterday was such a wonderful home school day. I was educated in the public school system and on certain holidays (like Valentines Day) I can't help but remember how fun it was to have class parties at school (I think most of us can agree that these were the only days at public school that we truly looked forward to). So, every year we do our best to ensure that we celebrate these holidays with gusto. This year we spent a few days making homemade Valentines to hand out to special people in our lives. The girls made cards for Mom and Dad of course, but they also made cards for our neighbors, friends, the public librarians, employees at their Dad's office, dance teachers,  tutors etc. They put a lot of time into them to make them special for each person. The night before Valentines they decorated a hoard of sugar cookies (and sampled some candies while they were at it). On Valentines morning they put the finishing touches on their cards and then we spent a large portion of our day playing "mailman.". We delivered some to Lake Superior State University's Library where their Dad works. The girls thought it was great fun, and got so into it that they even went out onto the main floor of the library and started offering cookies to college students that were studying. Then we delivered cookies and cards to our public library. We had also made Shrinky Dink necklaces with the Valentine John 3:16 verse on them and had them ready to hand out to anybody that caught our eye. I told the girls that instead of the day being about what we were going to get, lets go out and brighten the day for other people. I think we accomplished that goal. (And, making all of those cards counted as spelling, writing for the day)

Autumn's Valentine to her math tutor Jacob. She really used creativity to incorporate math concepts into his card.

Autumn wrote a Valentine themed story problem.

Math Cupid

This is Autumn's card to the librarians at our public library. It was very cute. 1. "Excuse me, are you a librarian?" 2. "Yes. Do you need something?" 3. "Yes. Do you know who wrote The Book of Love?" 4. "No. But I'll look it up in my computer." 5. "Can I help you find anything else?" 6. "Yes. A book on Archery please."




At the end of the day the girls and I went to pick their Dad Steve up from work. We were planning on having a quick and enjoyable dinner with him before he headed back to school to teach an evening math class. However, our pleasant evening became a little less enjoyable when Autumn's hand accidently got slammed into our car door. She was climbing over Alaina (because we had skis running through the center of the car) and she had put her hand into the back part of the door to brace herself as she stepped over them. Steve thought she was all the way in. The blood curdling scream that ensued followed by screams of "OPEN THE DOOR! OPEN THE DOOR!" is something I never want to relive. At first glance I thought her foot had gotten stuck somehow, but as soon as Steve opened the door and Autumn grasped her hand I realized what had happened. Of course, the handful of people in the parking lot walking to their cars must have thought a murder was occuring and a few came over to make sure everything was OK. Autumn was so scared and pumped up full of adrenalin that she just sat in her carseat clasping her hand and shaking like a leaf. The first time she finally pulled her hand away and let us look at her fingers I was sure they would all be bent backwards. By some MIRACLE she only had  a line of dark blue bruising across her knuckles! We rushed home and applied some first aid to her hand and sat there discussing just how awful that incident was and how much worse it could have been. When I got out of the car I put my hand in the car door where hers had been completely shut in and I closed the door as far as I could. It immediately began to pinch and hurt and there was no way I would have ever been able to shut it the whole way without my fingers all breaking! Just the thought of it still makes me feel like throwing up. I don't know how our little girl's hand made it out of that door with just bruises, but I don't think any of us will forget this Valentine's Day......We were blessed this morning with all of the joy our giving brought us, and we were blessed this evening with a tiny miracle. Because of this incident we have decided to implement a new "family car rule." No one will close a car door for anyone else without verbal permission to do so. Never, ever ever again do we want to experience those awful screams. (Also, I feel guilty because we all attended to Autumn's needs last night, but I never properly attended to my husband Steve's needs. Even though Autumn wound up being OK I could tell that he was feeling very ashamed and guilty and I didn't go out of my way to heal his hurting heart. I think sometimes we forget that when an accident occurs the person who caused it can hurt just as much as the victim....just in a different way)     QUESTION TO ALL YOU READERS OUT THERE: HAVE YOU EVER ACCIDENTLY CAUSED AN INJURY TO SOMEONE IN YOUR FAMILY? DO YOU HAVE A CAR DOOR INCIDENT TO SHARE?