Valentine's Day Play-by-Play

My first Valentine's Day with Brian started early yesterday morning. 

I thought I'd go ahead and give you the run-down on our day because it involved so much sweetness, (and a couple of really good recipes.)

So, I started the day by doing something that I very rarely do.  I rose before the sun.

...and before Atticus and Calpurnia.

...who, apparently, were not feeling the love that
early in the morning on Valentine's Day.

After a large cup of coffee from my Keurig, I finished decorating the cookies that I made, (aghem, from scratch.)

I found this recipe on one of my favorite Vegan blogger's sites, Chez Bettay.  I've had pretty great results from her recipes and I love the way that she writes them...great descriptions and super easy to follow.

(you can find the recipe here.)

The icing is my favorite part, it is a glaze that hardens over night, (much like black-and-white cookies) you can find the recipe for Vegan Royal Icing here.

After loading up the cookies I left the house and headed to Dunkin Donuts...

and then on to Brian's house.

With some help from Brian's sweet mom, I snuck in through the garage and woke the sleepy boy up. 

In reality, it was pretty selfish of me, stealing his last 30 minutes of sleep before school because I hadn't gotten to see him for 2 days, (law school takes up a shocking [saracasm font] amount of his time,) and because the third day is always tough and I didn't want to spend all day Valentine's Day missing him. 

I know, I know.  Deal with it.

So I didn't feel too bad about waking him up early since I brought him homemade cookies and donuts.

I also brought him this card that I found in this Etsy shop via Pinterest, (of course) that I love.

I also found a great plexiglass magnetic frame to
put the card in for good measure.

After Brian left for class, I headed to my favorite place on earth.

cue the chorus of heavenly angels.

And I picked up the ingredients to make this amazing lasagna I saw on VegWeb.

I might blog this recipe later because I made a few adjustments to it and it was a-mah-zing and I think that you should all try it.  Especially you skeptics.  Yes, you.

So, I made it home from Whole Foods and had just enough time to clean up the enormous mess that I made in my mother's kitchen with the frosting before I had to go pick up Lucy from school.

Remember how much fun it was when you were little and you went to school on a holiday?  Or on the last day of school before a holiday break? 

Well, it's just as much fun to pick up a kid from school on those days.

My sweet Loo.

After listening to her talk the whole way home about her "Balentinesth tweatsth", (and explaining to her what a chatter-box is,) I got the Loo home and down for her nap and had just enough time before Jenn got home with Mia to get the lasagna put together and to clean up the enormous mess that I made in Jenn's kitchen with it.

Moving right along, I had just enough time back at home to get everything together for dinner, (and dessert, but more on that later...) and to get changed to head back to Brian's for dinner.

Where there were these waiting for me...

And this...

beautiful turqoise wrap-bracelet.

I've been wearing a few bracelets for a couple of years now, and they all have special meaning to me.

The pearls come from my cousin Grove's home in Grayton Beach, one of my favorite places in the world to visit. 

The braided slip-knot bracelet is from a trip that I took to the Bahamas, (was taken on actually, for work, but it was actually a really relaxing trip with a lot of self-reflection, and the bracelet always reminds me of that feeling.) 

And the silver bangle was my great-grandmother's that my mom gave to me a couple years ago for Christmas.  I cherish it. 

Brian's bracelet fits perfectly with the others and it is so me.  He picked it out himself and it's his first Valentine's gift to me.  I love it and I'll always think of Brian when I wear it. 

So, we had the lasagna for dinner, and both went back for seconds.* 

It's Vegan.  And delicious.

Now, dessert.

I don't know if you've ever had a birthday dinner at P.F. Chang's, but if you have then you know what I'm talkin' about. 

cue the chorus of heavenly angels.

These things are deadly. 

I was grabbing the Tofu for the lasagna and saw some spring roll wrappers on the same shelf.  I literally gasped when this idea came to me.  I quickly googled the recipe and ran to the produce section for bananas.

*Unfortunately, we went back for seconds, and we were both so full that it was probably 11 p.m. before we even realized that we had forgotten about dessert.  In all fairness, we were watching the new episode of The Walking Dead so we were distracted.

BUT, I will be making these tonight so keep an eye out this week for the recipe.

Until then, here's hoping that your life is as filled with love and laughter as mine is right now. 

Happy Valentine's Day.