Okay guys – typically, these posts are a collection of all my favorites from the week but this week .. ALL I DID was read the Folk of the Air trilogy (the book I showed in my post on Monday) so really, this post will be a “Friday Favorites” of my favorites from today: Valentine’s Day!

A bit of a preface. I hate Valentine’s Day hahaha. I never really understood the hype behind it. Until I got married, most Valentine’s Days were either spent in lonely singleness or frustrated by unmet expectations from boyfriends. Hubby is actually really good about spoiling me on Valentine’s Day … last year, he surprised me with a Dyson hair dryer, this year I got a cute little purse. But it’s not really something that is expected and we definitely don’t dress up or go out on the day of. I feel like all the babysitters get booked up on Valentine’s Day and restaurants are running these fixed menus that are more expensive than usual, etc. It’s just not my scene.

And that leads us to today! This year Valentine’s Day not only fell on a Friday, it’s the Friday before President’s Day weekend so my kids didn’t have any school. Plus, Hubby usually tries to work from home on Fridays so it was fun because it felt like a vacation day kind of!

I started off the day with an early morning Bar Method class. You all know that I’ve been doing the 75Hard challenge and getting in the early morning workout helps me get the daily, sometimes twice daily, workouts accomplished. What you probably DON’T know that is that unrelated, my local Bar Method studio was running a challenge of its own from Jan 15 to Feb 15. The challenge was to take 20 classes in those 4 weeks, which averages to about 5 classes a week. A long time ago (like, before baby A was ever even conceived) I used to take Bar Method 5x a week regularly. Now, though, I like to mix up my workouts a bit more so making it there that often was seriously a CHALLENGE. And I was SO HAPPY because the challenge ends tomorrow and today marked my 20th class BOOYAHHHH! I don’t have to torture myself to go 5x a week anymore and that knowledge is my first favorite for this post!

After class, I came home and Hubby & I got breakfast ready together for the kiddos. I’m telling you, it seriously felt like the weekend today and I LOVED IT! This little one with her jam on toast is a FAVORITE of mine today.

These days, all three kids have hit a sweet spot in their ages where they can really play together and stay occupied just within their little group of three. I love overhearing them playing together in one of their rooms. Here they’re all playing with a little slime thing that E got from one of her class valentines.

Even though I said in my last 75Hard update post that I’m not holding myself strictly to a two workout/day regimen, I still try to get the second outdoor workout in if my schedule allows so after breakfast, I loaded up the kids and headed out for a hike at our local reservoir with our favorite M’s. Except, well, M2 was missing so it was just M1. I just took a whole bunch of snaps with my phone so I was pleasantly surprised to find that I had one shot with all the kids looking!

After the hike, I had to rush off to the spa for … THREE HOURS OF PAMPERING! I found this new spa nearby and they were offering a Pamper Package for Valentine’s Day that included a massage, Vichy shower treatment (like a body scrub thing), and herbal facial. This was part of my Valentine’s Day gift from Hubby and I’ve been looking forward to this spa day for weeks! Total favorite! (PS, now that the spa day is all done and over, I can say the spa itself is a new favorite of mine, too! Will definitely be going back!)

Man. If you want to butter your wife up for any reason, just send her to the spa! I came back home feeling like a new woman and I was in SUCH a good mood! And when I came back, I found this cute little Valentine that D wrote to his baby sister which only added to my good mood. How adorable is this!?

Frozen 2 became available for streaming earlier this week and I put it off for a couple days but ended up caving and purchasing it and you know what? TOTALLY WORTH IT. When I turn it on, nobody bothers me at all. Since yesterday, the kids have watched it 5 times … I’m not exaggerating. So, I know I’m going to get bang for my buck with this movie purchase. Listen, anything that will buy me some solid chunks of quiet time alone is a favorite and complete win for me, ok?

And my last favorite for today is this book that I just finished reading by Christina Lauren: My Favorite Half Night Stand! It was an easy read and made me laugh out loud. I’ll probably be talking more about it on the next episode of the Pen & Page Gals podcast so stay tuned for that if you’re interested!

I hope all your Valentine’s Days were filled with LOVE, whether that’s the love of family, friends, special lovers, or pets! Enjoy the long weekend! <3