February seems to have flown by—and not just because it’s a shorter month. It’s been a busy month, but a good one.

Valentine’s Day is always a fun for us with some special treats. We celebrated our daughter-in-law’s birthday last weekend. We closed on the rental house that my son and daughter-in-law had been renting. My husband is so relieved not to have an extra property to take care of. My youngest son found an apartment and will be moving next month. I’m excited for him but also facing the reality of an empty nest.

February is also the time of year when winter starts getting to me: the sky is often grey, the cold seeps into my bones, and I long for spring. Thankfully we’ve had some sunshine and temperatures in the 60s this week. We still have several weeks of winter, but each day brings us closer to spring! My daffodils are blooming already!

Creating

February is a big card month for us!

Early in the month we celebrated my youngest son’s 10,000th day of life. This was the card I made for him:

It took me a while to figure out what to do—I haven’t seen any other 10,000th day cards to get ideas from. 🙂 I printed off a February calendar and had a stencil with the shape for the saying.

Then I made a card for each family member for Valentine’s Day. I had seen several variations of this idea on Pinterest and knew I just had to use it since my husband is a scientist.

I cut out the beakers using Cricut. I tried various background papers, but they made the card look too cluttered.

This was for my oldest son, Jeremy, who likes foxes:

I used a stencil for the heart. I printed off the sayings or captions and inside sentiments from the computer since my handwriting is not good. I cut out this one with decorative scissors and then outlined it in black. I had the hardest time finding the right fox. I have several stickers and looked up clip art, but none of them looked just right. I had some wooden cutouts, but I wasn’t sure if the glue would be strong enough to keep it on, especially as this one had to go through snail mail. Finally I got the idea to scan the fox cutout and print it, and that worked pretty well.

This was for Jason:

The bear was from a scrapbooking paper collection.

This was for my daughter-in-law, Mittu, who likes purple:

I printed out the tree from some free clipart I found online, then used a paper punch on various scrapbooking papers for the hearts.

This was for Timothy, my grandson:

I had seen an idea using the moon on Pinterest, and then saw this moon and stars design on the Cricut.

And this was for my youngest son, Jesse:

I had seen several variations of this idea on Pinterest using typewriters. But since he types via computer, I used that. I cut the computer out with the Cricut and positioned the caption behind the computer “screen.”

And finally, my daughter-in-law also likes sunflowers, so I was looking to use them somehow for her birthday card. In looking for something else on the computer, I stumbled across a file that I had purchased on sale some years ago from Karla Dornacher using sunflowers. Since Mittu also has blue in her home, this seemed perfect. So it wasn’t exactly handmade, except that I printed it off and cut it out. But I liked it, and I think Mittu did, too.

I just checked Karla’s site, and she doesn’t seem to carry this exact collection any more. But she did use the sunflower design in this printable card set.

I made one more birthday card for a friend. But when I double-checked to make sure I had the right date, I discovered her birthday was in June! I thought I saw somewhere recently that it was in February. Oh well—the card is now safely tucked away until June.

Watching

I’m still working my way through the Lark Rise to Candleford series while using my exercise bike. Jim and I really enjoyed the new PBS series of All Creatures Great and Small. I was sorry to hear the story had been changed from the original—but we did like this version.

Reading

Since last time I completed:

• Fear and Faith by Trillia Newbell. Very good.
• Influence: Building a Platform that Elevates Jesus (Not Me) by Kate Motaung and Shannon Popkin. Also very good and helpful.
• Devotedly, the Personal Letters and Love Story of Jim and Elisabeth Elliot by Valerie Elliot Shephard. I knew a great deal of their story, but it was good to go over it again with their daughter’s insights.
• Be Loyal (Matthew): Following the King of Kings by Warren W. Wiersbe
• In Between (A Katie Parker Production, Act 1) by Jenny B. Jones. A YA novel about a girl put into a foster home after her mother is arrested. Despite the serious situation, there was a lot of humor and fun. Not my usual fare, but I enjoyed it.
• The Invitation by Nancy Moser. Four people are hand-delivered mysterious invitations to Haven, Nebraska.
• Write Better: A Lifelong Editor on Craft, Art, and Spirituality by Andrew T. Le Peau. Excellent.
• I just finished Nicholas Nickleby by Charles Dickens and hope to review it next week.

I usually read much more fiction than nonfiction, but that hasn’t held true this month.

I’m currently reading:

• The Laura Ingalls Wilder Companion by Annette Whipple . . . still. I keep it on the living room end table, but I don’t do much of my reading there. The book doesn’t fit in the other usual places I read. I am enjoying it: I just need to remember to pick it up more often.
• Be Holy (Leviticus): Becoming “Set Apart” for God by Warren W. Wiersbe.
• Preparing for Easter: Fifty Devotional Reading from C. S. Lewis. The first few entries in this book remind me I don’t agree with every point of his theology. But there’s usually plenty of meaty, edifying content in his work.
• Hudson Taylor and Maria: A Match Made in Heaven by John Pollock
• Do More Better: A Practical Guide to Productivity by Tim Challies
• Silas Marner by George Eliot

Blogging

Besides books reviews and almost weekly Friday Fave Fives and Laudable Linkages, I’ve shared on the blog this month:

• What Is Success? The Bible promises success to those who meditate on God’s Word, but it doesn’t usually look like we think it will.
• How Can We Love Like Jesus?
• Do You Read More than One Genre?
• God’s Part, My Part. Only God can make us grow spiritually, but He wants us to make right choices by His grace.
• Where Bible Reading Plans Go to Die. Leviticus often breaks the best Bible reading intentions. But here is encouragement to keep going.

As we turn the calendar page to March in a few days, we’ll have a busy couple of weeks with my husband’s birthday and my youngest son moving. But life should settle down a bit after that. I hope. You just never know.

How was your February? Any signs of spring yet?

(Sharing with Grace and Truth, Faith on Fire,Hearth and Soul,
Senior Salon, InstaEncouragements, Shannan’s What I’m Into)