Valentine's Day Wrap Up: Here's Where All the Romance has Gone

7:55 a.m.
Wake up my youngest son after finding my oldest son hiding under the covers playing his Nintendo DS.

8:05
Serve perfect heart-shaped pancakes. After the first round goes down pretty quickly I decide to start making oval-shaped pancakes, cutting them in half on the diagonal and flipping one side over to create a not-so-perfect heart shape.

8:55
Pack Coop's backpack with so many plates, napkins, cups, and utensils (all in cherry, cheery Valentine red) that it barely closes and is an obvious burden for him to carry. Then pile onto his outstretched arms his valentine box, bag of valenetines, and a valentine for his teacher. Push him, his little brother, and huge backpack into car for the 1-block drive to school.

9:05
Cooper falls out of the car under the weight of his backpack filled with plates, napkins, utensils, and cups.

9:10
I begin the thumb twiddling wait for a fellow swim league board member who is to arrive at my house at about 9:30. You know what this means. You've decided to skip the gym and you don't have enough time to run any errands so you're forced to do chores. I clean a toilet. Then empty garbages. Start some laundry. Load the dishwasher.

9:30
No sign of swim league board member. Continue with the chores and start to get a wild hair about a special Valentine's Day dinner for my family. Surf Pinterest for ideas, of course.

9:45
Record-short amount of time on Pinterest. Start really cleaning and wondering if I could have fit in a trip to the gym.

11
My swim league board member calls me to tell me she's running late. You think? And offers to bring lunch. Forgiven. She got me out of my gym trip, after all.

Noon
Receive a panicked call from fellow classroom mother wondering where I am and where are the plates, napkins, utensils, and cups that I committed to bring. Do I need to even talk about how the rest of this conversation went?

12:30-2:30
My swim league board member and I work on the lamest, most boring, aggravating document for the 400th time this year.

3-3:34
Scurry around making dinner plans, setting table, wrapping LEGOs and sending husband to the liquor store.

3:45
Leave the house to pick up Cooper and run to the grocery store to buy fondue supplies.

4:05
Begin awkward conversation with Cooper's teacher who is gorgeous, kind, and a Husker's fan. Assuming that because of her awesomeness and singleness that surely she has a romantic evening on tap. World: you should never ask a single woman if she has plans on Valentine's Day. Just like you should never ask a woman if she is pregnant. Poor girl looked at me and admitted that she and her other single girlfriends would be raising a glass and toasting another year of singleness. In an equally flummoxed attempt to fix situation and help her see that her plans sounded really appealing to me I say, "At least you don't have to put on highly uncomfortable, too small, sassy underwear for the annual you-know-what." All the while thinking, surely she knows that married couples never get to actually have romance on Valentine's and also wondering if it's too late to shoot myself in the eye. I don't really want to talk about what followed. The end.

4:15
As I walk with Cooper through the parking lot I think to myself, I wonder if I can convince Steve to take the kids to school tomorrow as my Valentine's Day present?

5:30
Cooper's ride to basketball arrives. I have to delicately explain that he is indisposed and would they please wait just a minute. (He was on the crapper.) And wouldn't you like to be this couple on Valentine's Day? They got stuck with evening practice carpool.

Steve starts mixing martinis.

7:11
Cooper gets back from basketball and the family festivities begin.

7:30
Burgers up and we all tuck in to a delicious, if casual, dinner.

8:30
I burn my finger on the double boiler I'm using to melt the chocolate for our chocolate fondue dessert. First ruin 3 bars of chocolate before figuring out what I'm doing. Good thing I have 5! Serve chocolate with pink marshmallows, pound cake bites, strawberries, banana slices, and green apple wedges. Yummmm-meeeee. Ouch. Did I mention I burned my finger?

9
One bite of that chocolate covered, pink marshmallow has quite the effect on Mason and he starts running laps around the kitchen island, then the ottoman in the living room. He does this about 28 times before coming in all pink cheeked and exclaiming he loves Valentine's Day.

9:42
Kids are finally in bed, an hour later than usual. And if you're married, you know what that means. At least one of us is already snoring.