Valentines…..again….

It's that time of year again when I do my annual rant about Valentine's Day. This has got to be one of my least favorite holidays. Now that Cade is in school it is only getting worse. Last Friday night Charity asked me what we were doing for this year's box. I hadn't even thought about it yet. I called Jay the next morning and asked him what Sunday was…he said the 14^th so I said yes, it's Valentine's Day…so what does that make Friday be? He thought for a moment and said the 12^th….I said yes, what will happen at school that day….he said it was Homecoming….I had to finally tell him what Friday was. It is the Valentine's Day party which means we have to have 23 valentines filled out and a box completed. Jay's answer was to tell me he had done the rocket ship the year before so that year was my turn.
I thought off and on about it all weekend. Mostly my thoughts were grumpy ones like…Valentines Day is stupid….if adults want to exchange gifts that's fine but why do we have to involve the kids in it….I'd rather them celebrate something meaningful like Presidents Day or Veterans Day, etc….. I asked Cade what he wanted to do for his box and his idea was some big plane something or other from Indiana Jones. Since we are limited to something that would fit in a backpack that got me out of the plane thing, but he was still stuck on the Indiana Jones idea.
Finally Monday night we somewhat got our plan thought out so I was somewhat done with stressing over the box. But then I remembered we still had 23 Valentines to complete. Around that same time Cade also told us that Mrs. H got grumpy with him because he didn't read enough nights the week before. I will admit we've gotten very lax on the reading thing. I know Cade can read and I know that he is a good reader. By the time we get through spelling words and math homework I'm done. Jay's done. Cade's done. I HATE reading logs. Jay and I are so burnt out on 2^nd grade homework. In kindergarten I remember some of the kids who never appeared on the super reader list. I thought what terrible parents…they wouldn't make sure their kids read each night. Now I understand. Those parents had older kids in school and they'd been doing the homework thing for many more years than us with multiple children. I'm surprised they didn't loose their minds years ago.
That caused me to go into my standard rant last night of…I graduated from HS in a class of 12, I went to MSU and graduated with honors and I never, ever filled out a reading log or brought home math homework in the 2^nd grade. Of course my rant fell of deaf ears because Jay and Cade had heard it before. Jay told me that my rant wouldn't get very far with the teacher. Which I know, it just made me feel better to say it. So after that and then a short lecture to Cade on how it's as much his responsibility to remember to read as it is ours, we aren't going to be there to hold his hand forever, etc. Jay sat down and told Cade what name to write down on each Valentine then he'd take it and put the sticker on it while Cade started on the next one. I tore apart a feed sack and used the brown paper to cover a shoebox. Yeah, Cade really learned his lesson….
The whole time we were working I thought about a kid in Cade's class who has three other siblings. They're all in school this year. That means they are making 4 boxes and 4 sets of valentines. The thought gave me chills.