Valentine’s Day is a special holiday for sweethearts, friends, lovers, spouses etc and that includes grandparents, on February 14 of each year. Valentine’s Day for us this year will be spent visiting with our grandchildren and grown children, out of town. There will likely be the Valentine’s Day cards and small gift-giving, even if the gifts are very cheap from stores like Walmart or Target.
Valentine’s Day gifts for lovers or wives typically mean sending flowers of one kind or another, but considering how overpriced flowers are during the Valentine’s holiday, flowers just never cross our minds to give as a gift to each other. I don’t mind at all either because there is really no good reason I can think of to spend so much money on Valentine’s Day flower bouquets that are just going to die in a few days.
We’ll wait until we arrive at our destination, where the kids and grandkids live, before we embark on buying any cards or inexpensive gift of some kind. The most we will do gift-wise is probably just buy a small toy for the grandchildren and just give cards to the adult kids. Since the grandkids are still very young, any Valentine’s Day gift for him and her may end up being a little toy they can play with to their heart’s content.
Maybe, and it’s a big maybe, we might also give the grown kids a small box of Valentine’s Day heart candy or something similar, if they’re not already sold out at the local stores near our hotel. Valentine’s Day is at the very beginning of our Chicago vacation trip for a week’s visit with the grown children and grandchildren, so planning anything special to do on Valentine’s Day may be a little difficult depending on their work schedules and other family responsibilities.
There is of course the weather to consider as well, so we’re expecting to plan mostly indoor things to do while we’re in Chicago, and spend some time checking out some of the new businesses, fun venues and restaurants that have opened up since we were there last. If it weren’t for the fact that we’re spending Valentine’s Day out of town, playing and having fun with the kids and grandkids, I’d almost say that Valentine’s Day for grandparents is overrated. Why?
Because neither of us are interested in the over-commercialism (materialism) of many of the holidays, especially Valentines Day and Christmas, and just because we’re grandparents doesn’t mean we will make a big deal out of one more holiday pushed on consumers to spend, spend, spend. We’ll just go with inexpensive, cheap, cheaper and cheapest.
If I had the time and inclination to actually make some homemade gifts for Valentine’s Day, like winter scarves or gloves etc, making gifts could almost count as a free Valentine’s Day gift since yarn is so dirt cheap. Since I don’t know how to knit or crochet, nor do I care to learn how, we’ll just make a point of stopping in one of the local stores and pick up something appropriate for the holiday.
From what all the grown kids have said so far while planning this vacation trip, all they care about is having us there for the week and spending time together “hanging out” and doing a bunch of fun activities around town that are soft on the wallet. Theirs and ours, since they pay their own way to each of the places we go while we’re in town.
Our not being expected to pay their way for everything we do and places we go is a great bonus, and we greatly appreciate their pre-planning of their budget to leave some room for spending Valentine’s Day with the grandparents, with their own money. The hugs, kisses, tickles and laughter are all free gifts to each other, and those last a lot longer than some stupid bouquet of flowers anyway.
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