When I was little, every Valentine’s Day morning there was a box of conversation hearts at our place at the table. I loved that, and so I wanted to find something to do for my own kids each year. I tried the conversation hearts, but the kids didn’t really like the taste. I tried making heart-shaped pancakes, but that ended in a temper tantrum. (Mine. It turns out I am more the sort of person who serves cereal in heart-shaped bowls.) I tried small boxes of chocolates (the kind made for kids, with a puppy or a panda or whatever on the heart-shaped front, and 4-6 pieces of chocolate inside), but the chocolates weren’t very yummy even for children.

One year I was out shopping before Valentine’s Day and the couple of kids with me went NUTS over the giant Hershey Kisses at the store. I went back later secretly and bought one for each kid, and they loved them, so that’s what I’ve done every year since—even now that they’re marked “#1 Teacher,” which, if you ask me, and I realize you haven’t, is a silly and limiting thing to do.

But perhaps your child responds to giant Hershey Kisses the way mine did to the boxes of assorted chocolates. Or perhaps your child has allergies, or gets too many candies from the classroom exchange already, or already gets the giant Hershey Kiss from the grandparents. In that case, I have some other, non-food ideas.

Melissa and Doug Heart Beads Set (photo from Amazon.com). (That one looks like it’s about to sell out; here’s another option, and another.)

Human Anatomy Heart (photo from Amazon.com). Ha ha, gross. But for the right child, this would be hilarious and awesome. (Here’s another option.)
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For Henry, age 4: Knight and Dragon 36-piece puzzle (photo from Amazon.com). Note that the box is (1) cute, (2) an impractical but fun shape, and (3) not a match to the puzzle. Whatever, I like it and it has the right number of pieces and he loves knights.

Melissa and Doug Pirate Costume (photo from Amazon.com). My parents are giving Henry this. We have the Knight Costume, and it was so much better-quality and more awesome than I’d expected. (I’d been picturing a Halloween costume, made of thin icky material that tears after one use. BUT NO: it’s like what you’d find in a classroom dress-up box.)
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I’ve been shopping for toys for my niece and nephew, and I accidentally got sucked down a Gorgeous Toys wormhole. My kids are all out of the baby/toddler-toy stage, and a LOT of their toys are UGLY and PLASTICKY. Feast your eyes on THESE riches instead:

Small Rainbow Stacker (photo from Amazon.com)

Plan Toys Balancing Cactus (photo from Amazon.com). I saw this in Ann Wyse’s gift post and SWOONED.
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I can make lists of toys I’m considering for the kids this year, and I likely WILL make such lists. But I also like to see lists of toys someone else has actually opened and played with, so that’s the theme of today’s grouping. This is mostly toys I’ve RECENTLY been surprised by and pleased with, but I’m also putting in a couple that our family has found enduringly fun to play with, and also one that I recommend you buy not for an actual child but for a grown up who likes miniatures/dollhouses (or MAYBE for a VERY CAREFUL child of the quiet and meticulous sort).

Melissa & Doug Magnetic Hide and Seek Board (photo from Amazon.com). A couple of times a year, my mom and aunt go shopping to stock their gift shelves and the toy rooms they’re responsible for freshening. This is one of the toys that most impressed everyone when we opened it up to try it out. They’d already realized that each door opened to reveal something inside (cookie inside the cookie jar, car inside the garage, etc.), but we hadn’t realized the item inside would be a removable piece. And in typical Melissa & Doug “impress ‘em by going one better than they even knew they wanted” form, the pieces are magnetic so they don’t scatter everywhere if you tip the puzzle.

Caring Corners Nanny Oakes Interactive Nursery (photo from Amazon.com). This is another of their finds, and I think what most impressed me about it was how little I thought I’d like it, compared with how much I did like it.
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Oh, man. William has been invited to a birthday party this weekend. Furthermore, he got the invitation yesterday, which means there is not much time to think. And William is the sort of child who, if you ask him what his BEST FRIEND SINCE FIRST GRADE’s favorite color is, will say “……Humm. Maybe….blue?” And if you say, “Well, what does she like to do? Does she have any hobbies?,” will say “…..Humm. Uh….” So on the topic of this weekend’s birthday child, a classmate he has known only since school started this year, I feel very lucky that he happened to know whether the child was a boy or a girl.

And eleven is a tricky age to buy for. I don’t even know what to get my OWN children in that age range. Well, there is nothing for it but to dig up some candidates, which is something I had to do before Christmas anyway.

Crafting With Cat Hair (photo from Amazon.com). I realize this is odd. I realize this is the sort of item that may need some further explanation, or perhaps would have been better suited to the unusual miscellany list from last week.
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I took Rob to an orthodontist appointment yesterday, and the orthodontist said to make the next appointment in 8-9 weeks. The receptionist said, “All right, so that brings us into January….” Do you realize what this means? In 8-9 weeks, the holiday season will be over. OVER. We do not have much time. Except for panicking: we have plenty of time for panicking.

I’m going to start by unloading a list I’ve been keeping for awhile of gift ideas that don’t seem to fit with other lists.

My sister-in-law bought me a bag of Choffy: she thought to herself, “Ooo, fun product! I want to try it! Who would want to try it with me?” ME. I DID. This is ODD STUFF. Picture coffee beans, and how they’re ground up, and then you make coffee out of them. This is the same thing, BUT WITH CACAO BEANS. The same beans used to make chocolate. Just let that sink in for a minute: it’s like making coffee, except you use GROUND-UP CHOCOLATE BEANS.
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This week a little virus sped through our household: sore throats and 103-degree fevers for everyone except me. If I ever wondered if I might have been a good and kind and angelic nurse in, say, an army tent with rows of patients, the answer is “Probably not.” Six people asking for more juice, more water, a blanket, the remote, maybe another piece of toast, was pretty much all I could handle pleasantly, and probably the adverb “pleasantly” is pushing it a bit, even in much nicer conditions and with much less upsetting illness/injuries than would be in an army tent.

There are certain things I keep in the house always, so I have them on hand when illness visits us and don’t have to add “running to the store” to my toast-fetching list:
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This was Elizabeth’s most successful tonsillectomy-recovery present:

Ravensburger Hello Kitty Hatbox Tin puzzle (photo from Amazon.com). She saw it when we were looking for something else, and she instantly wanted it. I balked at the price: why was it $14, when there are 100-piece Hello Kitty puzzles at Target for $3.99? I assumed the difference was in the tin (instead of a cheap cardboard box), and I didn’t want to spend so much money when I didn’t even know that she would LIKE to put together a puzzle.

So her loving aunt and uncle bought it for her, and I bought her a $4 one. And OH I SEE. No, it’s not the just the tin, it’s that the puzzle inside the tin is WAY better quality than the $4 one. Much larger overall size, and the pieces are thicker, glossier, sturdier, and fit together better. Furthermore, Elizabeth must have put it together twenty times that first week, and keeps bringing it out now to put it together again. And to my surprise, _I_ like doing the puzzle WITH her: it’s one of the few parent-child play activities I’ve found where I’m not suffering. When it started getting too easy for me, I did new things: only doing the pieces with no picture on them; only doing the trickiest parts and not peeking at the box while working on them; working on the puzzle while the picture was upside-down (as in, I saw the kitty face upside down, not as in the puzzle was face-down on the table); etc.

Where was I? Oh, yes: the surprising success of the puzzle. So now I’m looking for more puzzles in tins (100-piece is pretty much exactly her ability level), and wondering if “being in a tin” consistently means good things about the quality of the puzzle inside, or if it’s kind of hit-and-miss. At the very least, a tin means not having to try to figure out how to slice one of those cardboard ones open without destroying the box.

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I know clicking on ads only encourages them to keep making ads, but I saw a flask in an ad recently that looked like exactly the kind of flask I’d want if I were a flask-toting girl—and in fact, made me think maybe I WOULD become a flask-toting girl. So I clicked on the ad. Here is the flask:

Pink flask (photo from theweddingshop.theknot.com), $30.70 with personalization, $24.95 without. (I’d want to know if there was a space left for personalization if I chose the non-personalized option.) It’s more than I’d want to spend on a “See if I AM or AM NOT a flask-carrying girl” experiment, and also I think a big chunk of that price can be chalked up to “being listed on a bridal site.” It’s easy to lose one’s mind a little while spending for a wedding. [Two updates! One: Brenna mentions in the comments below that this pink flask and the hot pink one and the black one are on sale for $7.99! Two: When checking out, I found that the shipping to my zip code for one $7.99 flask was $10. So. But shipping for two flasks was ALSO $10, so maybe this just means I need to buy LOTS to justify the shipping cost!]

Maxam 6-ounce stainless steel flask with pink wrap (photo from Amazon.com), $6.70 with free shipping. That’s a significantly better deal on something very similar. It looks a lot smaller because the picture is a lot smaller, but it’s a regular-sized 6-ounce flask. And no concern about a space left for personalization. In fact, I talked myself into it and ordered one just now as I was writing.
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William, Robert, and Elizabeth have all been invited to a birthday party this weekend, so I need to come up with three presents for a 10-year-old girl. I could use a hand, if you have a minute—and then we’ll have this later as a reference for the next time we need it!

She likes cats, and she likes anything cute or fuzzy. She likes Phineas & Ferb, and SpongeBob Squarepants. She likes crafts. She plays soccer. She’s William’s age and grade and is mostly William’s friend, but she plays with everyone when she’s here.

Normally I aim for about $10 for a party gift (in this case, from each of the three children), but I’d be willing to go a little higher.

First candidate: Aurora Plush Fluffee Fluffy Tails (photo from Amazon.com), about $9.00. Most households already have more stuffed animals than they can handle—and yet, the sight of this cat reduced our household to “OHHHHhhhhhhhhhh!!!”s of cuteness.
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