14 February 2016

On Wednesday our ward held its New Beginnings night for Young Women.  The Young Women invited all the girls who will turn 12 this year to join them for a special night to learn about the Young Women's program.  It's also a night for the older girls to rededicate themselves to their standards and Personal Progress goals.  This was a special night for our family because it was Helen's first New Beginnings night and Sofi's last.

We planted these funny cabbage looking plants in the fall.  They've grown slowly through the winter and this week we harvested a nice crop of brussels sprouts.

 Here is our harvest-- enough for a couple of meals.  The plants behind the brussels sprouts are red Russian kale.  We planted it in the fall, too, and we mostly feed it to our turtle, Lily.  It's fun to feed Russian kale to a Russian tortoise.

 Helen made Valentines for her class by decorating Twinkies to look like minions.  She wrote "You're one in a minion" on each card.

On Sunday we started breakfast with a plateful of Valentines from each other.

 After church we made Valentine cookies: sugar cookie dough rolled in sprinkles with a Hershey hug on top.  Sofi took a plate full to her mission prep class and delivered a bunch to friends.  Once in a while, having food allergies works in Abe and Helen's favor.  They got to keep all the gluten free cookies we made for themselves.