A/N: Story Prompt: from wattpad's Valentine's story idea
Muse A and Muse B don't have plans for a traditionally romantic Valentine's Day this year. They thought it'd be nice to stay home and spend quality time with their loved ones instead. Muse A and Muse B make a whole day about family togetherness, sharing poorly-made homemade cards, playing games with valentine's chocolates that no one will eat, and finding cute little ways to make one another feel appreciated.
Summary: Ben & Bailey, Link & Amelia get the night out without their kids, while Meredith and Cormac babysit the night before Valentine's day
Feb 13, 2021
Meredith's house was extra busy this Saturday. The next day was Valentine's Day so they were providing child minding tonight. Scout, Tuck and Joey would be added to their five. So tonight there would be eight kids for dinner!
With her kids getting older and Cormac's teenagers at her house more often, it was decided to reclaim the nearly empty basement and make it into a usable space. The basement was finally emptied and thanks to a contractor a new bathroom was installed, proper utility room, a storage room, and heated sub flooring. The contractor accepted the delivery of the new area rugs, couches, end tables and wall cabinets and he assembled and installed all the required IKEA furniture. Today the goal was to get the TV and game system setup.
"Meredith, this looks amazing," Liam says arriving downstairs with the game system from the living room. Cormac was studying the instructions for the TV wall mount system. He'd picked up the new large screen TV on his way over with his boys, after first swinging by and switching vehicles as her SUV was much more suited to moving a TV than his Tesla.
"Thanks, Liam. And there's a new bathroom behind the stairs. Can you grab the bags of towels and bathroom stuff from your dad's car?" she replies, sending him on his next task.
"Sure. Austin, please get the games and stuff from upstairs," he says. It didn't take long for the four of them to get the basement setup, the bar fridge stocked with pop and the snacks for the evening loaded onto the counter across the back of the room.
"Can we make cookies?" Zola asks Cormac after Amelia returns with the four kids from the park.
"Sure what about Irish Lace Biscuits?" he says.
"What about chocolate cookies?" Zola says.
"How about both?" Ellis pipes up.
"OK. If we start with the Lace Biscuits we won't need to wash the mixer before starting the chocolate ones," he suggests.
"Smart! Zola's favourite recipe is beside the cocoa. Maybe I'll take Bailey outside to play soccer," Meredith says.
"Oh, I want to play football," Cormac teases.
"You won't like the cookie mess if I try and bake," she replies.
"That is true, you stay away from the kitchen!" he says kissing her.
Dinner with all eight kids went well. Maggie had put on a beef roast in the crock pot for mexican beef before she headed into the hospital for her on-call shift. When Joey and Tuck were dropped off, Ben had them bring in a pot of refried beans using Travis' recipe that everyone at the firehall loved. They all loved the build it yourself tacos and salad.
Joey and Liam were awesome helping with the younger kids, taking them all outside while Scout napped and Cormac and Meredith prepped dinner. As typical it was difficult to remove Tuck and Austin from the gaming system, but somehow the older brothers managed.
Before they got the home baked cookies for dessert, Meredith brought out nine boxes of mystery Valentine's Chocolates, as 10 month old Scout wouldn't be trying the chocolates. Each box contained 10 small flavoured chocolates with the goal to guess, the flavour. They were mostly milk chocolates, but also some white and dark chocolate. They had to use hints, like the shape, colour and toppings to figure out the flavour and if they'd like the chocolates. The round one is the cherry, the one with pink icing is the strawberry, the one with an almond on top is almond flavoured, etc. They did pretty well with their guesses, but didn't figure out the difference between the coffee bean and rum one. None of the kids liked the rum flavoured dark chocolate, with Ellis refusing to touch anything other than the fruit flavoured chocolates. The mystery chocolates was a fun activity with all the kids, Meredith was so glad she and Scout had found it while they were out shopping earlier in the week. Finding activities that kids from Kindergarten to Grade 12 would all enjoy was difficult. Liam was great sitting beside Ellis during the chocolate tasting, and he lucked out as he got most of the chocolates she wouldn't try, and even traded his strawberry chocolate for the salted caramel.
After dinner, dessert and dishes, Cormac loaded the four teens into the car as they refused to watch Lady and the Tramp with Meredith's kids. They had managed one short kiss before he had to catch up to the teenagers.
Once he got home he called Meredith and said, "Wish I could have stayed tonight."
"Me too. I'll see you tomorrow," she says.
"And mark Feb 19th on your calendar. Keep it free," he says.
"What do you have planned?" she asks.
"Bailey and Ben have my lads. Maggie, Amelia and Link have your kids. So you, me and my empty townhouse," he replies.
"Ohhhh," she says.
A/N: Thanks for the likes and comments. There will be at least 6 chapters to this story...