A rose for Valentine's

I'm of that generation of Dutchies who have not grown up with the tradition of Valentine's Day. First I heard of it was when we had American neighbours with 4 daughters in Breda, when I was 9 or 10, we became friends, I learned American English and they learned Dutch. They told me about Valentine Cards and I thought it was a rather curious thing to write anonymous cards to people you might like . It has taken a while for the Valentine's tradition to reach the Low Countries (I do think in general we're one of the most practical and rather unromantical people on this world), but commerce has its way almost always in the end ! So even in The Netherlands , if you can believe the ads and the news, today was a festival of love ... hence my soft pink rose for all the lovers in the world :-) To be perfectly honest DJ and I have not succumbed to commerce and apparently we have now saved around 110 Euro, which seems to be the average amount of money Dutch couples spend on Valentine's gifts. Maybe we can have a dinner out on that ;-)

Remember tomorrow's Abstract Thursday's optional theme is 'distortion' and the tag will be AT138.

Thank you very much for your kind comments, stars and even faves for yesterday's petals !