Early Valentine's Day gift

This year for Valentine's Day my husband wanted the ultimate gift.

For the Brooklyn Zoo to name a cockroach after him.

The zoo was naming their Madagascar hissing cockroaches after people for the low, low price of $10 per roach.  And it was what Mike really wanted.  So now there's a cockroach in New York named after my husband.  Romantic, huh?

Of course, I had nothing to show for it except for the lovely email from the zoo informing my husband of the gift.  I wanted to hand him something tangible for Valentine's Day.  So I made him this.

I actually went through a lot to do this.  I tried and failed (mostly due to my kids' desire to "help") at both fabric stamping and screen printing before finally just drawing the bugs on with a Tee Juice fabric marker.  The heart was painted on with screen printing ink.  It's a tote bag, which I hope will be handy, even if it's just to organize project parts in the basement. 

The kids made Valentines too.  My 19 month old daughter scribbled enthusiastically.  My three and a half year old son decided to maintain the bug theme for Valentine's Day, and drew a bedbug saying, "Hi Daddy!"  I'm sure we'll cherish it.