Happy Easter!

Wow, did we need an Easter rest! We were up early to attend 9 a.m. church . . . I know, I know, for some of you that's noon, but we are busy people and it seemed really early to us :) Awesome message (in the pastoral outfit I helped pick out, ha!), packed room, lots of people learning about Jesus! 

For the second service (there were four at two locations), Buck was the shuttle bus driver, and all the rest of us had classrooms to attend. Buck later joined me in the nursery, where we had a lot of criers, but plenty of helping hands to dry tears. Somehow I was, again, the only one who changed the diapers. I am so out of practice, ha! Those poor babies must be very patient for me to get from one end of the process to the other.

In between services, the kids (and we grown ups :) were thrilled to reconnect with our road-tripping new good friends. They're back, hooray!! (Mr. P wanted to get a bearded friend picture with Buck, since when he goes back to work he has to shave it :) And Mrs. P got us all arranged by the flower bushes on the church lawn for a mini family photo session (I was somewhat intimidated to do the same for her, since she's a pro!) So fun to have pictures of ALL of us together!






Gabby drew this cartoon rendition of the friend picture they took at church, it turned out so cute . . .



My Easter basket plan was new this year . . . the "baskets" that our kids have, they've had since they were toddlers. The things we put in the baskets seem to keep getting larger (for instance, a new ESV Bible for Gabby, and shaving supplies for Brennen--he was thrilled, okay maybe not, hee hee). I decided this year, I would wrap all their big stuff and just put coordinating numbers in their Easter baskets. That way when they found them in "classically hidden locations" (yeah, we're running out of options that the dogs can't get to and that haven't already been used in the past six Easters in this not-so-giant house :) they would bring their candy-filled baskets back to the living room, find their coordinating package, and then open their Easter goodies all together. This also helped prevent accidental glimpses of identical items should they find a sibling's basket before they found their own. So many layers, ha!





After unwrapping their bundles, the kids played with the neighbors while Buck made tacos for lunch. We spent a pretty relaxing afternoon enjoying the magnificent weather, reading books, and looking at everyone's Easter family pics on facebook. The kids played with their bubble wands, and the puppy played with the results of the bubble-making--he was highly entertained! (Do you like how we made our deck a giant play pen?) Graysen made a game of shooting the bubbles with his new squirt gun, sometimes the bubbles popped, sometimes they didn't! I'm sure there's a homeschool science experiment brewing in there, eh, oh well :) 




Eventually we put together our delicious Easter meal (I even got "crafty" in the kitchen and made the fanciest fancy eggs ever!) It was so hot inside with the grill going to smoke the ham! I think it would be cooler to leave all the doors and windows open and cook in the oven, but that ham was oh so tasty!







Our boys were tending the neighbors' dogs all weekend, so they had plenty of running back and forth to do, but overall our Easter Sunday was a really fun, relaxing day celebrating the everlasting life of Jesus and His love for each one of us!