happy valentine's day!!

by david's own admission he "sucks" at valentine's day.  the first valentine's day we were married i was so excited that i'd put together a "guy's bathroom kit"--i woke up early, made heart-shaped pink pancakes, pulled out the romantically-decorated bag, and sat on our futon-bed, expectantly waiting for a love gift from him, like a puppy waiting for a bone.  

well.  

that bone came in the form of an oversized container of generic-brand pink grandma-smelling bubble bath thrown in an even more oversized box with no hearts, flowers, or any sign of lovey-dovey special attention given to it.  and it was tossed at me at the end of a very long work day.  kind of like an apology.  only without the bells and whistles of a good apology.  poor david.  poor me!

...ha ha...kind of...

after a few years of failed expectations, then setting no expectations and just going to target for the post-valentine's day clearance candy sale, we finally settled on a valentine's day compromise:  lingerie...that's what worked to have both sides feel like they'd won a great valentine's day...  this year i had absolutely zero expectations, having decided we weren't going to spend anything extra, at all, due to saving for our house.  so when a couple of valentine's day celebrations popped out of a magical hat, i was definitely surprised!  

i've had a killer cold from the seventh circle of purgatory this week, and was really looking forward to my scheduled massage/chiropractor visit to work out those extra aches.  just as i was leaving for my appointment, the doorbell rang, and a ups guy was running back to his truck (and it wasn't david!)--david had ordered a dozen beautiful colorful roses!  the card said "love, david & max".  i looked over at david and said, "what about pace?"  david said, "yeah, pace wasn't interested in helping.  he was too busy watching a show.  but max was very involved in picking flowers for you.  i asked him, "max, should we get these flowers for mama?"  and he'd point and say, "no, those."  "ok, these colors, or those?"  "hmmm,  these."  so the flowers are from me and max, because max was very sure in what he wanted to get for you."  

then, at my appointment, david had upgraded my normal massage to include hot rock therapy...yes!  let's hot-rock this virus right out of me!...yeah, i know it doesn't really work that way... 

and then i came home and painted my toenails with sparkly pink love.

i didn't even notice the text we'd gotten from our realtor until that evening:

so we decided to go for a drive and check it out--we have a hole in the ground!!  it's for real!!  i cannot even say how many things have run through my mind--it's a scam, they're going to run off with our money, everything's going to fall through... 

here's the hole!

our backyard!

our address!

our sidewalk!--this is actually where our driveway is going to be!

our view!--all the lots around us are sold, too, so we'll be moving in with neighbors right away!

the boys were very excited...