Unintentional tradition.
My Valentine’s day memories are mostly caught up in grade school days. Remember picking out Valentine’s day cards for each of your classmates? Trying to match each person with just the right expression of fair-to-partly-sunny affection? The fun of decorating a shoe box/oatmeal canister/paper bag for collecting all your cards? The cookies, the heart-shaped everything, the candy?
Two years ago, our daughter decided she wanted to decorate her Valentine’s day box to look like something related to ancient Greece, the period of history she was studying in school. A brilliant idea. I imagined Greek columns drawn on a kleenex box. She had other plans.
When daddy heard about what our little girl envisioned, the two of them went to work and created this:
A bit challenging as a container of cards, but creative and unique nonetheless. She recently told us that she remembers being sad that daddy wouldn’t use real water. Ohhhh, how the mighty have fallen.
Last year, her class studied the Middle Ages. Once again, daddy and daughter went to work.
It’s a medieval castle. With flowers. I think possibly I was more involved in this one, because it’s very square and box-shaped and not nearly as unusual. But the cards had to go in and out through the drawbridge, so there is that.
This year, we’ve moved into American history. 
It’s Abraham Lincoln’s hat. It’s brilliant. I’ll send 29 chalky little candy hearts to the person who can tell me what it’s made from.
So this is our unintentional Valentine’s Day tradition: Historically appropriate card collectors. We probably have one more year where our daughter will want to do this, but our son is in kindergarten, where everyone decorated oatmeal cans this year. I figure we should get a jump start on next year and start thinking about something vaguely Aztec.
By the way, in the background of picture 3, you can see a bag of Kit Kats. I convinced the kids to attach Kit Kats to their cards this year.
Because when mommies sneak into their kids’ candy stash, there needs to be something more substantial there than little candy hearts.
Happy Valentine’s Day!
