Every year, around the middle of February, people break out the heart-shaped cards; chocolates and roses become hot-items on every lover's shopping list.

I love Valentine’s Day.

This is a vast change of heart from an opinion I held only a few years ago, when (in a column for another paper I wrote for), I boldly said I didn't care a bit for the holiday.

But each year that Valentine’s Day rolls around, as the stores and boutiques get decked in pinks and reds, as the massive (oversized, if you ask me) teddy bears get front row, and as chocolates of all kinds get stocked, I feel an inkling of sentiment for the holiday of love.

And I say this as a very single person.

Valentine’s Day gets a bad rap amongst the singles community, I think; I fully understand why - it’s not as fun to take yourself out to dinner when the restaurant is full of overly romantic gestures from dining couples.

It’s easy to feel alone when a holiday of love is shoving the ‘you don’t have a Valentine?’ propaganda down your throat.

But I think that’s just ridiculous - I’m single, not alone at all.

I have a tradition (not my idea. It stems from my obsession with Parks and Recreation the show and Leslie Knope, the character) of celebrating ‘Galentine’s Day’ with my closest friends and my sisters.

In season two of Parks and Recreation, Leslie Knope celebrates the day before Valentine's Day with all her gal-pals, in a created holiday known as “Galentine's Day.”

As Leslie Knope herself said: “Oh it’s only the best day of the year. Every February 13th, my lady friends and I leave our husbands and our boyfriends at home, and we just come and kick it, breakfast-style. Ladies celebrating ladies.”

And that's all there is to Galentine’s Day – ladies celebrating ladies the day before the restaurants become booked to bursting.

I think it is fair to say that everyone, as we progress in our careers and build families and relationships outside of our core group of friends, it becomes harder as adults to put the correct amount of emphasis on the people who form our circles.

With my own life, most of my friends live several hours away, and have busy schedules with work and families, and it can be hard to pencil in those oh-so-important gatherings together.

Which is why I love Galentine’s Day.

Galentine's Day is a time to put a pause on the bustle of our lives as young, successful women and thriving mothers, and just 'kick it' (as Leslie said).

A holiday for love shouldn't be reserved strictly for couples. There are many ways to love those around you, such as your family and friends, without it being a romantic love – so why does romantic love get the holiday while the love for friends and the love for family get the short end of the holiday-stick?

After all, as Leslie Knope says: “We need to remember what’s important in life: friends, waffles, work. Or waffles, friends, work. Doesn’t matter, but work is third.”