Seeing Stars and Hearts

The kids have had the Olympics and Valentine's Day on the brain lately. It's been fun to watch some of the amazing athletic performances happening in South Korea with Sam, Brie and Bas. On Friday night, we watched women doing flips on skis and men competing in figure skating. How great that the Olympics help us challenge gender stereotypes in such a powerful way.

Speaking of which, Maple Dale celebrated the Winter Olympics last week with a bit of friendly competition. Brie's class represented Australia and she competed in the bobsled.

Sam's class represented Canada and he competed in the luge! Every athlete medaled, in case you're wondering...

It was a fun week in many ways because the kids had just celebrated Valentine's Day with their classmates. And you might recall that our kids really enjoy making cards for all their buddies.

I'm not a big artsy-craftsy mom, but I love when the kids get into projects like this. It relaxes everyone.

Sebastian's preschool does not pass out valentines, but he hates to be outdone! He decorated a Valentine's box and then made valentines (complete with candy!) that he gave out to Brie's classmates at her...

class party! Oh, my, how Valentine's Day has become Halloween Part II these days. Candy, games and... 

more candy!

At least the holiday does still encourage people to pause and think about what they care about and why. Brie wrote this darling essay about Beth's dog Panda for her Valentine's Day essay.

And this one about her hip-hop dance class. :-D

Other Valentine's fun? A surprise care package from Gammy with cards...

and goodies!!

Additional stars and hearts of late? Brie's buddy Jia spent the night last weekend. It was the first sleepover that Brie has hosted and Jia has attended. They were both rockstars because they had a blast and then fell asleep at 8:30 p.m. and slept for 12 hours. Ha!

Bas LOVES his new high-tops. Aren't they precious?!

Brie got this cute shirt from a friend the other day. She's crazy about it. Gotta love geeky music humor!

Starring in the Rocky movie reboot this spring? Might be Sebastian...

Lousy winter weather has NOT been one of our loves this month. On Saturday, it flurried and our backyard is like a swamp from all of the rain we've had lately. So we broke out our old-school Nintendo. We're getting desperate, folks.

But the next day, the weather improved, so we got some outdoor time in and went to the aquarium with friends. Hard to say who the star is here...Findlay, Sam or that enormous shark!

Hope everyone had a very special Valentine's Day and that the Olympics are not costing you too much sleep! ★★♥♥☆☆YY