Great Gift ideas for Valentine's Day

According to the online source for all information - Wikipedia - Saint Valentine's Day^[1] (commonly shortened to Valentine's Day^[1][2][3]) is an annual holiday held on February 14 celebrating love and affection between intimate companions.^[1][3] The holiday is named after one or more early Christian martyrs named Valentine and was established by Pope Gelasius I in 496 AD. It is traditionally a day on which lovers express their love for each other by presenting flowers, offering confectionery, and sending greeting cards (known as "valentines"). The holiday first became associated with romantic love in the circle of Geoffrey Chaucer in the High Middle Ages, when the tradition of courtly love flourished.
Modern Valentine's Day symbols include the heart-shaped outline, doves, and the figure of the winged Cupid. Since the 19th century, handwritten valentines have largely given way to mass-produced greeting cards.^[4]



Older tradition
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, where many Valentine cards are now general greeting cards rather than declarations of love, was a harbinger of the future commercialization of holidays in the United States.^[5] It's considered one of the Hallmark holidays.

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 US, men spend on average twice as much money as women.<sup>[6]

Modern traditions - Blackstone's Great New Gift Ideas for Valentine's Day</sup>

<sup>Our well-liked Caspari Greeting cards for Valentine's Day definitely support the U.S. Greeting Card Association's estimates.  We also have chocolate lovers covered with local Harbor Sweet Chocolates.  But at Blackstone's we like to find unique gift ideas for all reasons and all seasons and Valentine's Day is no exception.  For the romantics, we have a great decoupage plate by our friends at Neptune 1 Studios.  The plate depicts one of three sections of a “pocket puzzle” made in the early 1800s. It appears to be an offer of marriage. To whom and from whom is unknown. The folded square piece of paper appears to have held a ring within.

The verse reads ....
“This heart which you do now behold, Will break when you these lines un...fold, Even so my heart, with lovesick pain, So wounded is,will break in twain.”. 

More great Valentine's Day gift ideas for the modern romantic to follow tomorrow including some great love quotes on Ben's Garden decoupage plates.</sup>