Enjoying Easter

I should be blogging about our road trip to Colorado during Spring Break, but we did so much and I took a zillion pictures - just can't bring myself to do it yet. So I'll skip ahead to Easter. This year we stayed home and enjoyed a relaxing 3-day weekend (Michael was off for first time ever), as relaxing as it can be keeping up with 3 active kiddos. :)

On Good Friday, some Moms and our PE teacher at Marion organized a neighborhood egg hunt. I took the big kids for a fun morning at the park. Luke was funny hunting eggs - he didn't go as fast as I thought he would this year. He wanted to inspect and comment on each that he found. His favorite (and first one he picked up) was "a gold egg". He ran all the way across the field during the hunt to show me his treasure. Me: "Yes, baby, that is a golden egg...now go." I think I said that 4 or 5 times before he continued on. :) Hannah enjoyed being with her friends and getting out some of her boundless energy and exercising that competitive spirit.

One of her talents... climbing the swing set and hanging like a monkey...why of course!

Hannah loves to do anything artsy craftsy so of course she was excited to dye Easter eggs. Luke participated for a while and decorated 3 eggs (he was more interested in playing baseball with Daddy, who can blame him?). Ryan supervised while eating his lunch. Many more years ahead dying eggs....can't say I'm excited about that one. :)

The Easter bunny came to our house and loaded the kids up with sugar and treats. The bunny did good bringing Hannah "The Lorax" book (which we had just been to the theater to see) and a Harry Potter Lego set. Luke liked his map puzzle and yo-yo. Ryan got his first goldfish - yum!

As always, it was a rushed morning fitting it all in and to getting over to church on time. I admit that I practiced "drill sergeant" style parenting throughout the morning and you can see the unhappy faces in some of the pics. But it was a good opportunity for the kids to hear me apologize and talk about forgiveness - an important meaning of Easter. Luke was receptive as well, telling me, "That's okay, Mommy!" several times on the way to church. He has such a good heart!

You can see the kids annoyance especially in the last one here - I made the big kids go back outside and take another picture with the baby once he was dressed. It's Ryan's first Easter, right? I needed all three of them in a photo! :) This was the best shot I got and it cracks me up because we had wardrobe issues with each of them. I had matching outfits for the boys but I changed my mind at the last minute for Ryan because I wanted him to look more like a baby (he has years and years of wearing Easter dress shirts ahead of him). Ryan's outfit was cute enough but too big, Luke's shirt is hanging out and Hannah for some reason buttoned up her sweater so you can't see her dress. :) Oh well! We tried to look our best at least.

Someone got into the Elmo Egg and tried to take his first candy bite!...