It May Be a Hallmark Holiday, But...

I admit it, I like Valentine's Day.  This year is the 18th Valentine's Day since Hubby and I started dating.  The first couple years were long distance Valentine's Day celebrations, but since they were my first years of having a boyfriend for the holiday, I was still pretty excited about it.  Poor Hubby, he tried to have flowers delivered to me at school the Valentine's Day of my senior year.  This was before www.proflowers.com and the simplicity of being able to just place the order online.  Not before the internet, but before it was the easy way to send flowers.  So he went to a flower shop in his town, and had them place the order for flowers to be delivered to me by my flower shop in my town.  Somewhere along the way, the communication broke down and my flowers never got delivered.  I was crushed that I didn't get flowers at school, and he was pissed they didn't deliver them.  In the end, I got my flowers, and they were gorgeous, so all worked out just fine.

Anyway, since we live together now, it's considerably easier to get flowers to me.  Not fool proof, though.  When I woke up this morning and sat down at my computer, the first thing I saw on Twitter and Facebook was other people in Columbus bitching about the snow.  We keep our curtains in the living room closed, so we don't have to worry about people across the alley staring at us.  So I figured I'd slip my shoes on and go peek on the balcony to see what it looked like outside.

This photo was taken about noon and it looks like late evening.  It was pouring the snow and the wind was howling.  I stayed outside precisely long enough to take 2 steps out the door, snap a photo, and run back in.  It was not fit for man nor beast out there!  Hubby was going to walk over to the store next to us and buy flowers for me, but they wouldn't have survived the snowstorm, even if he had been willing to walk in it.

I was immensely glad we had not made any kind of reservations at a restaurant or any plans to go out.  We generally cook a nice meal together at home on Valentine's Day, rather than battle the crowds and wait times to go out.  Our day could carry on as planned, from the warm, safe, dry inside of our apartment.

I had been planning our dinner for almost 2 weeks.  I figured we'd tackle something more ambitious than we usually do, so it would be a special meal.  We made Poached Chicken with Creamy Tarragon Sauce from a French cookbook I bought.  {I posted the recipe myself on AllRecipes, but credited the cookbook and author.}

It was absolutely delicious.  I was concerned about making the veloute sauce, since we don't have much experience with sauce making.  It turned out amazing, though. The chicken was perfect, and the sauce was creamy and wonderful.  For dessert, I kind of made up my own recipe for Easy Chocolate Mousse Pie, which was also wonderful and unbelievably easy to make.  {Not very authentic, though!}

Sometime after we ate, we realized we needed to go to the store for a couple things.  The blizzard conditions had abated, and the store is almost directly beside the apartment complex, so we decided to try it.  Fortunately the gusty winds had blown all the snow off the car, so we didn't have to stand in the sub-zero windchills to brush the snow off.  We just hopped in and cranked the heat while the car warmed up.  There were a few inches of snow on the ground, but since they hadn't made any attempt at scraping the parking lots or side roads, we weren't buried in.  We ventured over to Giant Eagle and got what we needed.  While we were out, Hubby managed to get my Valentine's presents and they made it home without getting mutilated by the wind.

The puppy is about the cutest thing ever.  Hubby knew I would like him cause he's all patchwork and "a scruffer", as he said.  And he was right.

We got home without freezing to death, which was kind of a miracle.  That wind was brutal.  Since my Achilles Tendon is injured, I can't walk very fast... but you better believe I was hobbling with as much speed as I could muster.

We finished out a lovely Valentine's Day with some sparkling wine.

All in all, it has been a wonderful day and a romantic evening.  Something about it being so damn cold outside makes it feel much cozier and comfier inside!