Happy Valentine’s Day!

Hard to believe we are over a month into the new year of 2009 already! Time flies when you’re having fun, working, and raising children.  We hope your New Year has started off well and continues to be wonderful!

Valentine’s Day is an occasion celebrated on February 14 by many people throughout the world. In the West, it is the traditional day on which lovers express their love for each other by sending Valentine’s card, presenting flowers, or offering confectionary.  The holiday is named after two among the numerous Early Christian martyrs and Valentine.  The day became associated with romantic love in the circle of Geoffrey Chaucer in the High Middle Ages, when the tradition of courtly love flourished. 

Valentine’s Day is most closely associated with the mutual exchange of love notes in the form of “valentines.” Modern Valentine symbols include the heart-shaped outline, doves, and the figure of the winged cupid.  Since the 19th century, handwritten notes have largely given way to mass-produced greeting cards.  The sending of Valentines was a fashion in nineteenth-century Great Britain, and, in 1847, Esther Howland developed a successful business in her Worcester, Massachusetts home with hand-made Valentine cards based on British models. The popularity of Valentine cards in 19th-century America was a harbinger of the future commercialization of holidays in the United States.

The U.S. Greeting Card Association estimates that approximately one billion valentines are sent each year worldwide, making the day the second largest card-sending holiday of the year, behind Christmas.  The association estimates that, in the U.S., men spend in average twice as much money as women.

Happy Valentine’s Day from “The Sister Team”!

 

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