Valentine's Day 2023

Valentine’s Day arrived this year and my youngest son requested basketball-themed valentines for his school party. For the last few years we have strived to send non-food, non-candy, and allergen-free valentines for school parties, in support of my nephew who has a lot of food allergies, and this year was no exception.

I found these basketball pens on Amazon and they came in a pack of 24. Of course, we only needed 30, so I ordered two packs.

We headed to Pinterest for ideas for cute things to put on cards. And we’re suckers for a cute pun!

Next I made these simple basketball cards in Adobe Illustrator. The back just says “Love," and my kid’s name on the same basketball image. I printed them on my home printer onto card stock and cut them out with a 2.5 inch circle punch. The punch I have is Martha Stewart’s brand and it’s an awesome punch, but it’s been discontinues. Here is one from Fiskars that will work great. FYI, a 2.5 inch circle fits perfectly on a wide-mouth mason jar lid.

I attached each pen to a tag using some washi tape that I had to buy because I’m not a frequent user of washi tape. I found some food-themed tape on clearance at JoAnn’s.

In hindsight, I just should’ve used clear tape because at times the washi tape covered up some of the words.

Here’s a breakdown of the cost of this year’s valentines:

• basketball pens - $20.98/pack of 24

• washi tape - $5.99 for 8 rolls from JoAnn’s, on clearance

• card stock - already had

• printer - already had

At the end of the day, each valentine came to just under $1 each.

I have a love/hate relationship with printers. After owning and working with printers from Canon, Epson, Brother, Xerox, and HP, I always end up with HP because the print quality and color management has always proven to be closest to what I see on my calibrated monitor. Right now I have an HP Envy color inkjet printer. The print quality is okay, but nothing compared to a HP photo printer I had years ago (I STILL miss that printer). But ALL printers have their moments. Mine currently doesn’t want to connect to my desktop computer, it will only print from my phone. ::massive eye-roll:::

Here you can read about valentines I have created for previous years.

Does your family celebrate valentines day? If so, what traditions do you follow?

10 Signs Your Child Might be a Foodie

How many of us start out this parenting gig thinking we’re not going to “let” our kids become picky eaters? We introduce them to a variety of flavors and textures early on and make sure they are encouraged to try everything. You try expose them to foods from different ethnicities, then watch helplessly as they spiral into the threenager stage and will only eat mac n cheese, chicken nuggets, and foods that aren’t “noisy” or “squishy.” What went wrong?!?!

I think most of us can agree, even the most devout of foodies will have kids who go through picky phases. We just have to do our best to keep showing enthusiasm, rule out or work with any allergies or sensitivities to textures or flavors, and do our best to muddle through it; hoping for change as they get older.

My kids went through very picky phases. For a while my oldest wouldn’t eat beef because “it takes too long to chew.” As a toddler he LOVED broccoli, peas, and spinach and then at age four he refused to eat anything that was green.

My husband and I are both big foodies. We try to make a variety of different foods at home and now that our kids are well passed the toddler stages, we usually include them in meal planning. When we travel, what we can eat plays a big role in deciding where we go and we make a point to not eat at restaurants that we have at home. 

I’d love to think that our enthusiasm when it comes to food played a role in how un-picky our kids have become, but I know a LOT has to do with their personalities. We have plenty of foodie friends whose kids are still struggling to outgrow their pickiness.

HERE ARE THE SIGNS:

1. In their head, trying new foods is an adventure rather than a chore or something to fear. Almost ALL samples are tasted at grocery stores and Costco. Latest discovery? Pâté. Our grocery store was sampling a rosemary and duck pâté, spread on little toasts and my son literally closed his eyes and moaned with his first bite. Then he asked if we could buy some for Dad, not knowing that he already loves pâté. 

2. Ask them their favorite food and it will be something many kids (and even many adults) don’t care for or think is gross or weird. My kid? Salmon sashimi. Shoyu ahi poke (raw, marinated tuna). Deep fried chicken livers. Lengua (beef tongue) or cabeza (beef head) tacos.

3. It’s library day at school and your kid checks out cookbooks instead of books about Fortnite or soccer.

4. Their birthday is coming up and rather than ask for a party at the local trampoline park or playground, they ask for a Chopped or Iron Chef-themed party at the local grocery store that has cooking classes. 

5. “What do you want for dinner?” is followed by requests for Japanese teppanyaki, Korean BBQ, Indian curries, or Hawaiian plate lunches.

6. Trying a new recipe? During dinner your foodie kids critique the dish with an assessment worthy of Iron Chef: “The texture is wonderful, but I think it needs to be seasoned a little more.” “I love the blend of flavors, but maybe a side of rice would be better than pasta.”

7. Foodie kid opts for summer cooking classes instead of ninja warrior camp or taekwondo camp.

8. While on vacation you have to explain to your child that they cannot have salmon or tuna for six days in a row… because there’s a mercury thing. I have actually had to have this conversation with my oldest. 

9. When having dinner at a sushi restaurant, your foodie kid ditches their family to sit at the sushi bar and chat with the chef about where the tuna came from or different ways to prepare salmon.

10. Your foodie child skips the cereal or candy aisle at the grocery store and instead browses different spice blends and the meat counter to see what’s on sale. 

I’m so, so grateful we’ve left the picky phase with my kids. Every day I count myself lucky that there are almost no foods that my kids won’t at least taste. They’re still working on foods that are even remotely spicy and raw veggies and salads are still a no-go, but we’re getting there.

Traveling Gingerbread Man 2

In 2019, our friend Jaxon had an assignment in his class where he asked friends and family to send postcards and notes claiming they met the Gingerbread Man on their road trips and travels. I leveled up on our adventures and had a TON of fun in Photoshop adding the Gingerbread Man to some photos and sending fun messages to Jaxon’s kindergarten class. You can view that post here.

Last fall, my niece Maddie’s kindergarten class was doing the same assignment and I was STOKED to get to create a few more images and also send the ones I made before. Below are the photos along with the letters we sent. For these, we actually printed everything out and sent them in cards. Apparently they were a HUGE hit in her class.

Hi Ms. Conti's Class,

It's Matthew and Tommy again, Madison's cousins. We've done a lot of road trips lately, and it seems like we share a lot of the same interests as the Gingerbread Person. This July, we bumped into them while exploring the Trail of Ten Falls at Silver Falls State Park in Oregon. This trail is so amazing as we hike through a lush forest and we can see ten different waterfalls over the 9 mile hiking trail. On many of the waterfalls, the trail goes behind them! Thankfully, the Gingerbread Person didn't get too soggy when we splashed in the water with them. Wouldn't want them to lose an arm! We also shared some s'mores with them at our campsite. What a beautiful place to visit!

Hope we'll bump into them again this summer.

Love, Matthew and Tommy

Hola Ms. Conti's Class!

It's the Wong Family again, saying hello to Madison and wanting to share that we had a fun afternoon with the Gingerbread Person at Crater Lake National Park in Oregon. Crater Lake is the DEEPEST lake in North America at 1,949 feet deep! Wow! It's a crazy deep shade of blue and was formed from a volcano, so there are no rivers or streams that flow into or out of it. Pretty cool, right? We hope you can visit one day because it's such a beautiful place.

Adios, the Wong Family

Hi Madison and Ms. Conti's Class!

We spent a day exploring Garden of the Gods in Colorado Springs, Colorado. The sandstone cliffs and canyons look a lot like many places we've explored in Utah, but it has its own geological history. We watched some kids do some rock climbing, they climbed so high! It was a pretty hot day, but that didn't stop us from enjoying a couple of short hikes with the Gingerbread Person. We shared some fruit snacks and trail mix and we chatted about where they were headed next. The views were gorgeous and it was a really amazing place to explore after being on the road for so long. We hope you can check it out one day.

See ya! Matthew & Tommy

Below are a few repeats from the previous iteration:

Hello, Ms. Conti's Class,

Madison's cousins, Tommy and Matthew saying hi and sharing yet another Gingerbread Person sighting. They must have had the same road trip plans as us this year. We ran into them at the north shore of Lake Tahoe, California and they joined us for a swim in the crystal-clear water. The water is so clear in Lake Tahoe that we can see more than 50 feet down and it's the 2nd deepest lake in North America. We bid farewell when we got wrinkly fingers and advised them to do the same. Since they're made of gingerbread, we didn't want them to get soggy!

I hope they had a great time on the rest of his road trip!
Adios, Tommy and Matthew

Hi Ms. Conti's Class,

It's Tommy and Matthew again, say hi to Madison for us, we miss her! We were on a road trip with our parents and we stopped at the Bonneville Salt Flats in western Utah to see if we could watch some race cars break land speed records. Did you know that the Bonneville Salt Flats are left over from when most of Utah was a massive ancient lake?? Lo and behold, we saw The Gingerbread Person too! They were scoping out some rocket cars and enjoying the weather. Thankfully it wasn't too hot, but wow, it gets bright when the sun reflects off of the salt! Sunglasses are a must! Wonder where they were headed next?

Best, Tommy and Matthew

Hi Ms. Conti's Class!

We are the Wong Family: Alex, Bill, Tommy and Matthew. We're Madison's cousins and we live in Utah. We were exploring Arches National Park in Moab, Utah earlier this year and you wouldn't believe who we ran into: The Gingerbread Person! They must have been on vacation, exploring the beautiful sandstone desert. They were so nice by sharing some gumdrops with us and we shared granola bars with them on the trail. We were totally photobombed too! What a stinker!
Love, Tommy and Matthew

Hello, Ms Conti's Class,

It's the Wong Family again, Tommy and Matthew. We were hiking with some friends in Big Cottonwood Canyon in the snowy Wasatch Mountains of Utah this week and we ran into our old friend, The Gingerbread Person. He said he was hoping to get in some skiing before another snow storm came through, and we hope he found some slopes, because it's supposed to snow again tonight!

We hope you're staying warm this winter, miss you Madison!
Cheers, Tommy and Matthew

Valentine's Day 2022

Happy Valentine’s Day to those who celebrate! This is not a holiday we typically do anything for; feeling that’s it’s mostly driven by retail companies. That being said, creating fun valentines for school parties has become something I do look forward to each year.

This year my oldest son proclaimed “we don’t do valentines in middle school.” I rolled my eyes at him, but whatever.

At least my second grader still does valentines! We opted to go with non-food valentines again this year right when Sticker Mule was having a great sale on 3x3 inch holographic stickers. So he and I worked on a quick and fun design and I got them ordered. Have I mentioned that he loves bacon?

Next up was some kind of card to put the stickers on to give out at his party. We needed something for folks to know who these were from. I created a 4x5 inch card so I could print four on a page. I added a bacon border that matched the sticker and added his name. I had them printed and trimmed at my local Office Depot and they were ready within an hour.

I LOVE how these turned out! Here’s a breakdown of the pricing:

• 50 vinyl, holographic stickers, roughly 3x3 inch - on sale - $31.10 (incl tax, shipping was free)

• 12 pages printed on card stock (4 cards per page) and trimmed - $11.84

• double-sided tape (we already had some)

• Total: $42.94

That came out to $.89 cents per valentine for 48 valentines. There are only 25 kids in my son’s class, but he will also give one to his teacher, the class aides, specials teachers (music, PE, art, Spanish, etc), and the two administrative assistants. The minimum order for the deal on Sticker Mule was 50 stickers, so even if he only gave them out in his class, we’ll have leftover stickers to share with friends or I can list them in my sticker store for a few bucks.

Overall, this wasn’t crazy expensive and I love coming up with a fun way to do non-food, non-candy, allergen-free valentines.

Coyote Hills Elementary Logo

A while back my friend, Brandi reached out to me about creating a new logo for the elementary school where she’s a teacher. It just so happens to be the same elementary school where both she and I were students back in the 1980s. The school district made some big changes last year, and one of them included a new name for our old school and I was asked to help them with a new logo.

It has been such fun to be part of the process to rebrand MY elementary school.

They had students submit hand-drawn concepts for the logo and the school committee (made up of teachers and the principal) chose one as a conceptual starting-off point for me. That drawing involved a howling coyote with beams of light in a circle around it. The landscape I created in the background is a portion of Coyote Hills Regional Park that the school is named after. I grew up hiking in those hills and going there on field trips!

It was a fun process taking that student’s artwork and turning it into a professional logo and I’m really happy with the final concept. I sent them multiple versions of this logo in one color, two colors, and three colors. That way they have multiple options in the event they want to print on t-shirts or make stickers.

Thanks so much for this fun opportunity!!