Parenting | It’s About Love

by Kirsten Nilsen, posted on February 14th, 2013 in Parenting

heart-attack-game

I have to confess, I love Valentines Day. LOVE IT. I make heart-shaped breakfast for my kids, I craft each of them their own card every year, and set the table with heart placemats. But the sappy jewelry ads on TV – He went to Jared! – and the insistence in our local grocery store that no man should turn up at home on the 14th without a dozen roses and a huge helium balloon? It makes me crazy – and not in a cute way.

This year we started a new family tradition, as a mini-rebellion if you will, against cheap chocolate and forced jewelry purchases. At dinner on February 1st, I gave them each a paper heart and a Sharpie, and asked them to think about where they’d seen love that day. Had they done anything loving? Had they watched someone be loving in any way?

I thought it’d be a tough sell. I was sure I’d be met with blank faces (and maybe some rolled eyes from my eldest). Instead, the ideas came bubbling out of them like a chocolate fountain – She let me play with her Polly Pockets! They included me in their game! Daddy helped Mommy clean the basement!

We called our game Heart Attack, and I told them I wanted to fill our entire fridge door with love this month. My second grader proudly prints his own, every night, and loves doing a ‘sneak attack’ by posting hearts when I’m not looking. It breaks my heart in a million good ways, that my boy is so quick to see love.

valentines-day-cupcakes

This is the point, really: I want so much for them to see the love that surrounds them on a daily basis. To know, deep in their hearts and on all of the other 364 days in the year, that love is everywhere if you’re looking. For me, it’s a gift I can give a kid looking at a near-future of first crushes and middle school and mean girls, to know that real love is so much bigger than a silly stuffed teddy bear or a single long stemmed rose. It’s a gift that a second grader overwhelmed by cursive and math homework can keep like a touchstone in his pocket. It’s a gift that a preschooler takes out into her world and spreads like sticky jelly fingerprints: YOU ARE SO LOVED.

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Comments

16 Responses to “Parenting | It’s About Love”

Cindy H Says:
February 14th, 2013 at 1:48 pm

Kirsten, you brought tears to my eyes. This post should go viral!
~Cindy H

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Jennifer Cooper Reply:
February 14th, 2013 at 2:26 pm
I agree!

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kristin Says:
February 14th, 2013 at 1:49 pm

i love this! such a great post – thank you. x

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Vickie L Says:
February 14th, 2013 at 2:18 pm

Kirsten, this is great. And it is marvelous that your son is tuned into love at a young age. :-) Boys can be discouraged about stuff like that from peers.

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Melissa Says:
February 14th, 2013 at 2:20 pm

Kirsten,

God has given you such an amazing gift. I’m so happy we met all those years ago. Thank you for continuing to inspire me to not only be a better parent; but a better person.
xoxo
Mel

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Giulia Doyle Says:
February 14th, 2013 at 2:32 pm

Love this! I was talking yesterday to someone on how sad it makes me that so many are ‘anti’ valentine or jaded – that bitter approach that a holiday is being forced on them. Your post is exactly what I was trying to explain…love, friendship, empathy…all of this surrounds us, the fun the happy…I don’t have cable, so I’m not being inundated with commercials, so maybe that’s why I’m seeing everything pink :). But hey, hubby thought it was so fun when he discovered the bathtub filled with heart balloons this morning and my kids gasped at the strings of paper hearts hanging from our chandelier and we truly enjoyed making chocolate sprinkle spoons for all their little school friends.
While we all try to remember the wonderful in our everyday – sometimes it’s just great to pull out the pink glasses, the hugs and kisses and eat a beautiful cupcake!

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Jennifer Cooper Reply:
February 14th, 2013 at 2:39 pm
I’m with you Giulia!

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Jane@Buzzmills Says:
February 14th, 2013 at 2:47 pm

So sweet. What a sweet sweet idea and simple enough for even young kiddos to try too. Thanks for sharing…

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sara Says:
February 14th, 2013 at 3:34 pm

Great post. Thank you :) I especially like the “Daddy helped Mommy clean the basement” bit.

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Jennifer Cooper Says:
February 14th, 2013 at 6:17 pm

We are so doing this next year!

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bth Says:
February 14th, 2013 at 7:27 pm

For those wishing they’d thought of it in time for Valentines Day, we do the same thing for Saint Patrick’s Day but with gold coins (dollar store circle-shaped notepads and yellow crayon). We drape green crepe paper to hang our homemade gold paper coins on. It all leads to a dollar store pot of gold. We write good deeds and kindnesses noticed.

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Tricia Jornada Says:
February 14th, 2013 at 9:27 pm

Loved the post – you are so fun to read!

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Monique B Says:
February 15th, 2013 at 11:09 am

Friends of ours do something similar for their teenage daughters throughout the year – leaving a note on their bedroom door with some sort of appreciation or recognition. I thought it was so lovely that we started doing the same thing for our young children. It’s a great reminder for us all to acknowledge and appreciate the positive. Thanks for sharing!

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Mrs. Pear Tree Says:
February 16th, 2013 at 12:17 am

What a fun way to celebrate, and bonus points for encouraging your kids to pay attention to and appreciate gestures of love beyond those that are directed at them!

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Vicki Says:
February 17th, 2013 at 6:14 pm

Such a lovely idea!

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Shalini Says:
February 18th, 2013 at 12:33 am

Just Beautiful. Wishing you and your family a wonderful heart filled month. What a super idea to fill up the frigde with this. We made origami hearts and strung them on string and wrote our messages to the people we gave them to on them. But I would love for us to fill up a heart shaped area (that I will create) with these thoughts. THANK YOU.

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