Valentine's Day on the Cheap

 This year for V-day I made beef jerky for my beloved. He will know this truly a sign of my love because I HATE touching raw meat, which is an unavoidable downside of making your own beef jerky. (Although it's very tasty, and super easy and inexpensive to do if you have a dehydrator and a jerky gun.) Including the cute container to put it in, it cost me less than $4. For my kids I found some cute V-day socks at Old Navy for 70 cents each and a couple books for a few dollars each.
 In the past we have made it a point to not go out to dinner on Valentine's Day. Even the places that are usually empty are packed. When it's so busy service seems to decline and you spend a large part of your evening listening to each other's stomach's growl as you wait for your food. So we have made it a tradition to make dinner together, and then go out a few days before or after. And Valentine's is the one day of the year that I make his favorite dessert, that I hate. This year we'll make heart-shaped pizzas as well as a few batches of cookies. Showing your love doesn't have to cost a lot of money.