Being a great old romantic that I am I wanted to see all the Valentine's day displays across the supermarkets in Omaha. So we started out at Bakers. Oh wow! There were wonderful displays of strawberries dipped in chocolate and some with a white vanilla stripe as well on sale. Infact we were so tickled to see a shop assistant making little bouqets of chocolates which were up on display and sale for your loved one.

The floral department in HyVee really set my senses all aglow with their range and variety of fresh flower bouquets and live flowering plants. Large Classic Romance bouquets were on sale from $ 65 made up entirely of beautiful red buds. A small and less expensive bouquet romantically called Just for you was priced at a little over 18 $ which seemed reasonable for smaller budget. But the 25$ bouquet called Sweetness caught my eye with its delicate carnations in a blush baby pink and a bright and colourful vase for them all. Hy-Vee had plenty of roses, chocolates, wine and balloons for people to spoil their Valentine with. According to the National Retail Foundation, more than half of the gift givers this year will buy candy, spending $1.6 billion.

We had rushed into Walgreens to buy some rice cereal for baby and ended up eyeing the chocolates for Valentines Day! If you love nuts they have special Mauna Loa Milk Chocolate Covered Macadamias for 5$ and an Atkins Endulge Chocolate Peanut Candies for 6$. For Swiss chocolate lovers there was a lot of Lindt on display --Lindt Emblem Gift Box Gold Premium Assorted Chocolate for 15 $ and Lindt Chocolate Swiss Luxury Collection at a reduced price of 8$. Those who prefer truffles there were Lindt Lindor Truffles for a great reduced price of 8$.

At Aldis there were great buys for your Valentine which could keep her warm after a candlelight dinner. There are boxes of ladies Gift Socks and also beautiful rose covered PJs to keep warm while watching a romantic movie. There was also a lovely pink scarf with silver roses all over it for just 5 $. Aldis is great value for money for sure and we ended up spending more than the planned box of strawberries and mushrooms!

All the stores were filled with inflated balloons in the shape of hearts or with the word love across them. Bright and shiny the feeling of love seemed to pervade the stores and the environment around. It's a fun day and a great reason to toast the one you love. Need not be something extremely expensive but Valentine's Day is a universal celebration across the globe of love.

And whoever said love makes the world go round, could not have been closer to the truth.