Happy Valentine’s Day, friends!

Last night after work and school, we had a mini-marathon family Valentine-making party, with some secret projects in different rooms, and a lot of construction paper action. Pearl and I worked on decorating one for Andrew (which I bought at Hammer Press in Kansas City last fall, one of my favorite cards I’ve ever snapped up), shortly after the two of them made me a pretty killer all-handmade one with lots of hearts and a super-sweet message inside. It wasn’t hard to distract Everett away from Pearl working on one with a vivid portrait of him on the front, and after she went to bed I pinked a heart from my favorite Denyse Schmidt dots and sewed it on a card for her. Whew! This was our breakfast table this morning with grandparent Valentines waiting to be opened too. It was fun!

Pearl also made a whole family of Valentines for her grandparents, aunts, uncles and cousins, which I just loved. Andrew cut out hearts and she proudly drew each member of the family. They each got emailed photos today and hopefully the real thing will roll into their mailboxes shortly too!

But if you are over the age of three and a half and after some truly gorgeous last-minute Valentines, please stop by the Hello!Lucky blog and download any or all of their free (!) vintage-inspired Valentine cards! My favorite is the cuckoo clock but they’re all awesome. Thank you, Hello!Lucky!

I stopped by Collage this morning and picked up some treasures, including some good Easter presents for Miss Pearl (I never seem to be following some cool blog schedule of sharing my Valentine’s stuff early enough to do anyone else any good, then Easter stuff when anyone else might also actually be thinking about it too… oh well). The markers, one Moleskine, and the sun print paper are all for her. The other Moleskines might find a home with me, I have an idea I’ve been wanting to try to customize a plain journal. Maria was so awesome and helped me find just what I was looking for – including markers that don’t dry out when the lid vanishes into playroom chaos. Who knew?!

I’ve been working on my PMQG name tag this week and was so happy to track down the exact Sharpie I needed there in that perfect turquoise color, so I can write west coast crafty on my white bias tape before I stitch it down. Here it is in progress, looking a little worse for wear after a tote-bag trip for matching purposes. I’m so excited to finish mine, and see everyone’s name tags at our February meeting! If you want to make one too, here are lots of inspiration photos, courtesy of Heather, and Petra’s original post with photos from her presentation at our January meeting.

Last, here’s some more info about the Collage party. It sounds so fun… hoping to go for sure!

If you go:
Collage’s Sellwood Grand Opening!
Saturday, February 18 from 10-6
Special discounts and 60+ raffles, all day!
7907 SE 13th Ave. in Sellwood’s Historic Antique Row, Portland
503-777-2189

Okay, I’m off to make a red wine chocolate cake. Have a wonderful V-day!