Valentine's Day: cost of romance rising for flower delivery, 4 other things

When you arrange for flower delivery or take a special someone out for dinner this Valentine's Day, it'll cost more than it did a year ago. That's the cold hard fact about a warmhearted and festive day, according official US inflation data.

But the rising cost may actually be a relatively small one: Those chocolate or flower prices haven't been rising at gas-pump-fast rates. Here's the official inflation tally of five common Valentine's Day activities, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

- Mark Trumbull, Staff writer

1. Dining out

A full-service meal away from home has risen 2.9 percent in price over the year that ended in December. That's just below the overall rate of consumer price inflation, which was 3 percent. But over the past decade, full-service meals have gone up just a bit more than overall inflation, which totaled 27.8 percent for the 10-year period.

By the way, the BLS doesn't give average prices in dollar figures. So a reminder of the obvious: The meal will cost more at Chicago's Alinea Restaurant than at Applebee's, and there are lots of options in between.