Sweet as pie

Yesterday was Valentine's Day. Up till now, this day has been all about what Mark is going to do to impress me. Generally, this means I get one of my 2 annual cherry pies. You must understand, Mark's cherry pies are the best in the world, so this is a powerful gift. This year Mark was bleary eyed from doing our taxes while struggling through a migraine so I decided to switch the focus. At that point, I wasn't sure a pie from him was even possible. Furthermore, had he attempted it, I doubt it would have been edible. Artists can't help but put a bit of their soul into their work and his soul was pretty black at the time. So, though I did have fun planning balloons, flowers and taking a heart shaped cookie cutter to a wide assortment of finger foods for the girls, the big thrust of the day was celebrating daddy. He got a special card featuring a picture of his two littlest valentines, an insert made by Julia, some sweet sentiments from me, and Dean Martin's Amore CD from Starbucks. Who knew Dean Martin sang. Not me. Fortunately, neighbor Bruce came through with the recommendation and we had lovely romantic music to share that night. The biggest gift, by virtue of being the trickiest part of the evening to pull off, was my attempt to create the illusion that we live in care-free comfort and casual elegance. Meaning I cleaned the house, dressed the girls nicely, made sure everyone was well rested, and had a nice dinner on the table when he came home. I even made the pie. Too bad the crust was simultaneously hard and chewy (weird). That's what you get when you let an amateur into the kitchen. Oh well, he got to pretend he lived with a 50s era TV housewife for a night and that is about as good as it gets. Actually, the night was great for me, too. I got to eat the great meal, drink the wine and dance to On the Street Where You Live with my honey. That brings me to the best part of the night: after dinner we got up to dance for our girls, doing our hokey waltz-esque moves. We must have been especially inspiring because they wrapped their little toddler arms around each other and joined us on the dance floor, giggling and hugging. Totally sweet as pie.