Valentine’s Day Orchid

My husband isn’t much in to traditional things - and since he isn’t I’m not either. I used to be. We tend to celebrate every day rather than go all out on designated holidays. Rather than buy flowers and cards, go out to dinner or whatever, we just acknowledge the day. But today was interesting in that our orchid - which hasn’t bloomed since we received it as a housewarming gift five years ago - bloomed today of all days! My brother and SIL gave the plant to us when we moved from Capitol Hill to northern Virginia and we have cared for it ever since - without a lot of luck. No matter what we did, nothing happened - until last October. What I thought was just another root turned out to be a stalk. And I have been watching it every day since then. Apparently the orchids do bloom in the winter and we were thrilled to watch its progress. The only thing that we did different was turn the pot the other way so the roots faced the window and the little bit of sun that was coming through the west side. So in honor of Valentine’s Day we are so happy to see that the orchid plant finally bloomed! What a great day for it to show itself! 

Happy Valentine’s Day!

It’s nice to be remembered - not just on Valentine’s Day, but any day. But since it’s Valentine’s Day we received three special notes and treats. One was from our condo social committee. They spent a lot of time baking cookies and then assembling small packages of the cookies, along with a Hershey kiss and candy heart and placed them on the door handle. Our next door neighbor never forgets to leave a sweet treat by our door for every holiday. And then we received a text from my mom’s neighbor/caregiver who took such good care of my mom until the end. She and her husband now live in my mom’s home. It was a gift my mom left for them for being so kind. So it’s a good day to celebrate the people in our lives. A little chocolate and cookie goes a long way. But the more important thing is having people around that are so nice. 

The Kind Neighbor

We moved from Capitol Hill to our condo in northern Virginia almost two years ago. We hardly had any time to get oriented to our building and our neighbors when the pandemic hit. We met a few people, but for the last year we have hardly seen or heard from any of them. At Christmas we came home one afternoon and there was a card and two candy canes by the door. When we opened the card, we had a feeling who it was from - our next door neighbor Pat. We sent her a thank you email to let her know how much we appreciated her thoughtfulness. Then this weekend, after coming home from a walk, there was a valentine chocolate heart by the door. We immediately knew who it was from. We sent another thank you email thanking her again for being so sweet, after we devoured the chocolate. One can’t say enough about having nice neighbors. We had them in the Midwest and stay in touch to this day. In Capitol Hill the neighbors were a little less “kind” although there were a few folks we at least had conversations with. So thanks again Pat for being our neighbor. It means a lot - even without the chocolate and the candy canes.