Scattered across the tabletop were scraps of red and white paper, pieces of paper doilies, ribbons, scissors and glue sticks. Some Valentines were in process, some completed and a few had fluttered off the table and onto the floor.

Jenny the Activities director folded and creased squares of paper to form cups that would be filled with candy hearts.

There were rubberstamps with “I Love You” and red and silver ribbons adorned with glitter to proclaim the holiday of “Love.”

“Who thought this up?” Sarah mumbled from her wheel chair as she struggled to reach a glue stick. “I love you. Everything says, “I love you.”

“A saint of course.” Replied Rita. “It’s always the idea from a saint when we have a holiday.” She licked a paper silver heart and placed it in the center of a lace paper doily.

“I could Google it.” Ralph liked the answers to questions. He put down his piece of ribbon and picked up his phone.

“You can do that later Ralph.” Jenny sighed. “Craft time is over in few more minutes.”

Ralph ignored her protest and began reading out loud. “It says here…..

No one noticed that a little girl had slipped around the corner and entered the room. Her head of blond curls crested above the tabletop like a thistle puff.

A buzzer sounded.

“Time to clean up. Let’s get everything put away.” Jenny waved her arms over the plastic boxes.

The little girl picked up a valentine from under the table and left the room, as the adults shuffled the containers back and forth across the table gathering up all the items.

The little girl returned to a chair in a room around the corner, snuggled down into the cushions and fell asleep, as her mother seated in a nearby office, cast anxious glances and wiped away an occasional tear.

That night when the mother tucked her little girl into bed she noticed the child was clutching something in her hand.

“What’s that?”

The little girl opened her hand. “It says, “I love you.”

“Where’d you get it?”

“Grandma sent it to me.”

As long as a child remembers, a grandparent’s love does not end.