Love is in the Air…

…or, rather, in our bellies!

These scrumptious cookies – Pecan Linzer Heart Cookies with Strawberry Jam Filling – came out sooo yummy. Light, nutty, crunchy, and slightly sweet with the jam flavor. And, they were easy to make! Are you surprised? They are from Martha Stewart! Usually, her recipes can be tricky, but this one wasn’t too bad at all.

In addition to giving a cookie to each one of my girls, I also surprised them with a special Valentines party this past Tuesday night. Typically, Tuesdays are “Dorm Devotionals.” But, with the H1N1 craziness and trying to catch up on schoolwork, I figured the girls deserved to have a bit of fun in the middle of the school week. They also left for Midterm yesterday (Fri), so it was a nice way to finish the first half of Term 2.

For our Valentines party, I took them off guard by hosting it in the little coffee shop run by the Juniors across from our Kedong complex. They loved it! It’s sort of like a coffee/music bar one would find in an urban city setting. Strobe lights, old couches, books and magazines on antique tables, bar stool chairs, random pictures and old RVA yearbooks, etc. Very cool. We enjoyed mini brownie ice cream bites with heart sprinkles, the Martha jam cookies, caramel popcorn dyed light pink with food colouring, and mocha cappachino drinks with chocolate syrup and mini marshmellows.

So, when they first came in, I had “Bleeding Love” by Leona Lewis playing and all the lights off and little heart candles burning throughout the room 🙂 They were so surprised and thought it was quite cool! I had them pin a small, paper heart onto their shirt, and if they said the word “like” or “love” and somebody caught them, that person got to “steal their heart.” The person with the most hearts at the end of the evening won a small prize. It came as no surprise to me when Kassie, who has perhaps one of the biggest hearts of joy and love for others that I have ever known, had 7 hearts at the end as the first prize winner 🙂

Then, we played Valentines Musical Chairs with this “Love” playlist I created, which included classics and pop songs and the like. It was absolutely hilarious. “Wishin and Hopin,” “L-O-V-E,” “Kiss the Girl” (Little Mermaid)…so many fun songs to choose from.

After a winner emerged, we then moved into Valentines BINGO!

A fellow RVA staff member had just returned from the States and brought some red, pink, and white M & M’s back for me. I thought they would make The best part, of course, was eating them AFTER the game.

And, of course, no Valentines party would be complete without a group shot of all of us in our red, pink, white, and black colors!

At the end of the night, I quoted Jeremiah 31:3 to the girls:

“I have loved you with an everlasting love; therefore, I have continued my faithfulness to you.”

There is something so sweet, simple and strong about Jeremiah’s words. A love that is from everlasting cannot be constrained by time, space, or a beginning. It has always been. What a joy it was to tell the girls how much I love them, and how glad I am that God brought them into my life! They fill my heart with so much happiness and laughter. Even more amazing was getting to remind them of how much greater and wider and deeper is the love that Christ has for them!

One other fun part of this Valentines week was being sung to by the Sophmore Singing Valentines in the middle of the afternoon on Upper Field while I was watching my girl’s Varsity Soccer Game! Every year, the Sophmore Class do “Valentines Sales” and make cookies, and deliver balloons and roses, and go about doing surprise, singing Valentines for individuals. Students and staff can purchase a Singing Valentine, pick a song, and have the group “deliver” it to a friend or sweetheart. So, one of the other dorm moms – Candace – sent me “You’ve Got a Friend in Me.” It was so sweet! Here I am with the people who sang to me:

This post is dedicated to my girls, whom I love with all my heart!

Kassie, Kirsten W, Kirsten N, Ha Eun, Eun Ae, Sigrid, Segyo, Julia, Rebecca, Bree, Yoyo, Esther, Emily, Anna, Sarah, Amy, and Jacquie