A Sticker Situation...

I really thought I was being clever. Little A had taken to ripping the books I gave her to 'read' at night before going to sleep, and it frustrated me to no end. And broke my heart a bit. I loved that she would content herself with a book for the few minutes between the end of our bedtime routine and sleep itself. I just couldn't abide going in to get her in the morning and find one of our beloved stories in a heap of little flakes beside her bed.

Then about a month ago, A got invited to her first birthday party. As part of the treat bag, she got a few sheets of stickers. I let her play with them and gave her a piece of paper to put them onto. It all seemed to go well. So well in fact that little alarm bells went off in my head, reminding me of my younger days when sticker albums were all the rage.

The next time I was out after that I found a cheap little sticker album and a few sheets of stickers. If nothing else, it gave me a 20 minute reprieve while she busily took stickers from one surface and affixed them to another.

She loved the sticker book. Loved it like no other. As a matter of fact, she loved it so much that she (still) clutches it to her chest and chants, "I love it I love it I love it!!!" That's when another little alarm bell went off. What if she took the sticker book to bed? After a long drought of no books at bed time, this might be a welcome change of pace.

That night I sent her off to bed with said sticker book in hand and we were both serenely content in the knowledge that we both got what we wanted. She, a book to 'read'. Me, the peace of mind in knowing that good money and a good book were both spared. If she ripped the stickers, who cares. I spent the rest of that evening congratulating myself on being one clever chick.

That is, until my husband got her up in the morning. Stickers, so I neglected to take to heart, stick to things. She did rip the stickers. Just about every last one that she had in her book. And they were stuck to e-v-e-r-y-t-h-i-n-g. Her sheets, her blanket, her pillow, her hair, her stuffed animals. And still, a nice little pile on the floor. What I thought was a win, clearly a fail.

She still loves the sticker book, and it's still in rotation. I haven't put it in a time out. I just seem to be having the darnedest time finding any new stickers for it.

So it's Valentines Day. I'm not a huge celebrator, but I do enjoy it. It seems to perk everything up right when you need it, in the midst of February. A nice colourful day when everything seems endlessly gray.

A and I did some crafts.



Here we did the melty the crayon bits in the wax paper thing, then used my Cricut cutter to cut out some hearts. She loved this. I let her help as much as she could, even sticking the hearts on the window. We also made a card for constable daddy guy with the Cricut, which was very cute but I forgot to take a picture.



Then we made some cookies. Well, I made some cookies. My crafting partner had a particularly long nap this afternoon and I had to get these in the oven to free it up for supper time. But she swooped in at the last minute to help decorate the last four on the sheet. The little design on the cookies was courtesy of my friend Carrie (now sadly blogless) who sent a little care package for the two of us not long ago, which included some cookie stencils. Just so happened that a few days after receiving the package, a tutorial popped up online on how to make your own coloured sugars. Voila! Just plain sugar cookies, cut and stencilled. Too easy.



Also in that care package was a couple of meters of ballerina flannel, since my BFF knows how much my little girl is into ballerinas at the moment. It was kismet, since I was just about ready to go buy some fabric to make her a little bath robe. She always makes a fuss over my robe and she always seems a little chilly after her bath so when I mentioned to her that I would make her one, she was quite excited. I gotta say...the cuteness meter went waaaaaaaaaaaaay off the charts when she put this on. To see her walk around the house with it on too...it just about kills me. And it fits her to a 'T'. I can't stand it.

A and I both got lovely flowers from the special dude in our lives. I always enjoy getting fresh flowers and to see my little one's face light up over her very first rose was pretty priceless, I must admit. She keeps wanting to smell it! I think I'll have to press it for her.

Anyhow, now that Valentines Day is all wrapped up, I'm going to crash on the couch with a tea and a cookie. Hope y'all had a nice day. Until later...