Easter

Our big activity of this past week was, of course, Easter.  We have had our annual tradition for Easter going for quite a few years now and we were happy to continue those traditions this year.  First off, we are at Ron and Elaine's for a breakfast and an egg hunt with the Bergherms and Isidros.  Like last year, Duncan and Allen rode their bikes over via some lenthy route and met us there.

I had decided this year that I was going to have a "golden" egg of sorts and put in a $5 bill in a random egg.  I stuffed them all Saturday night and was proud of my egg with the bill all folded tightly - - in fact, it was an egg within an egg.  So Sunday morning I mentioned to the kids that there was going to be special egg that might have some money in it.  And Calleigh says "Oh, I bet it will be $10!" Poof, my excitement vanished!  Now it would be a letdown to only find $5.  Guess I should have kept the info on the money to myself.  Lesson learned.

We had a lovely breakfast and then Duncan and Allen went out to hide the eggs.  Ron herded all the kids into the living room and put the TV on and was going to show us some footage they had recorded of  some boys stealing a bike out of the garage next door.  Ron and Elaine have like five or six security cameras set up around their house recording and keeping footage for at least several days and they so happened to catch the thieves red handed.  Very exciting!  Anyway, after Ron showed it, the footage went to a live view and suddenly we could see Duncan and Allen and where they were hiding all the eggs.  The kids thought it was pretty funny.

Pretty sure Brady is going to be my only lefty :(

We missed Bruce who was reffing at Disney.

The kids were out running around in the backyard and Blake said that Calleigh was sitting on him and his head bumped into the tree...or something like that!  So we got some ice for his head.  He was fine.

The hunt went great.  We let the kids start in waves and Colby was up first but he had NO idea what he was doing and it took him a minute to catch on.  But then all the other ones came tearing up behind him and it was a mass of kids running all over the place.  In the end, Brady ended up being the one with the "golden" egg and fortunately $5 is exciting enough for him.  

Annual kids photo.  It is now complete with baby London.

Waiting for Duncan to tell them "GO!"

Brady discovers the money

Family picture in our orange.  It's okay to wear it in the football offseason.

We went home for a few hours - - long enough for Colby to sleep and for me to make a fruit salad and stuff another four dozen eggs and then it was off to the Hilliards for the annual Hilliard/Bergherm Easter party.  It is always a nice time to catch up with people I don't get to talk to that often although some of us kept interrupting ourselves to see where our small children were due to the close proximity of the pool.  It's potluck style and I always find that I stuff myself so full because everyone brings such good food.  And then there's Brady who ate some chips and a fruit truffle because that's all he liked.  Arghhhh!

Men's table.

At least we know Colby enjoyed his meal.

The second egg hunt went well too although as I expected, Colby was completely freaked out by the Easter bunny just as Brady was at the same age.  The kids must have collected like 40 eggs each and seriously they have more candy than I don't know what.  I will be slowly confiscating about 90% of it over the next week.  And no, not to eat it myself because I can't stand the stuff.  I will never be able to do that Jimmy Kimmel joke on the kids where you tell them "I ate all your Halloween candy" because they know that would never be true.

Braelyn happened to be wearing the same dress as the girls.  I had gotten them the night before at Old Navy and I had even thought right before the party, "It would be cool if Braelyn had the same dress." I have NO idea why that thought crossed my mind but it did and there you go!

There is a vast, vast area to be covered on this hunt.

Buddies

The moment Colby spotted the bunny.

Going back to Sabbath...we switched services this week so we could enjoy the Easter service that went on during third service.  Typically we do church first (which is second service) and then go to Sabbath School.  We are actually planning to reverse services in July when the new year starts and the kids will be switching to their new classes.  The music, among other things, is a little too contemporary for my taste.  I know that makes me sound old but so be it!  The problem with switching things up is that the kids are attached to their friends in their Sabbath Schools so you hate to change it.  But, a lot of their friends go to the first SS, so I think it will work out just fine and in fact, Calleigh has already asked to go back to it.  And oh, the music!  How nice it was to hear the choir and sing from the church hymnal.  I am a traditionalist at heart, what can I say!

After naps, the Isidros came over for a visit and we took them on their first Geocaching expedition. Such a good time and Braelyn even found the first cache so that was extra exciting.  The kids were begging to find more but we had to stop after three and go home and eat.

One of the finds along the West Orange Trail

The kids open it up.  Look at Colby even in there.

 

Calleigh found the second one.

I think she found the third one too.

So, the other big thing of this week is that Colby is no longer nursing.  It kind of pains me to say that. It truly is the end of an era.  My body is my own once again.  I have either been pregnant or nursing since August of 2006 and it's kind of a weird feeling that I don't have to think twice about taking medicine or what have you.  The stoppage happened very naturally.  He is sleeping in much later now (between 7:30 and 8:00) and often Brady is already up by the time Colby wakes up so Brady will go in with me to get him up.  Who can think about getting milk when your big brother is there to play? Last Sabbath Colby slept in so late that I had to wake him and there was no time to nurse.  The next morning, I put him on to nurse and he put his mouth there for a half second, didn't do anything, took it off and that was that.  The end.  He went to 19 months which is the same as the girls (Brady went to 20).  I'm a little emotional about it but now at least there is theoretically nothing to stop me from sleeping in on a Sunday morning or going overnight without him!

Why have milk when I can eat asparagus instead?  That kid was shoveling it in.  Hopefully this means his eating style will be more like Aubree than the other two.

This week was such an amazing week of school.  Calleigh didn't whine, complain, cry, or throw a fit, at all!  I don't know what happened.  It's like having a baby and they have a good night of sleep and you try to figure out EXACTLY what you did leading up to it so you can duplicate it and have it happen again.   I couldn't figure it out but hopefully it wasn't a one week fluke.  I made sure to praise her up and down and in front of Duncan too.  We are doing some of the Southern states right now in History so we learned a lot about Rosa Parks, George Washington Carver (made a sweet potato pie in his honor), and Helen Keller.  I found a great movie on YouTube (seriously, what would I do without YouTube?) about Rosa Parks and then we watched the Disney version of "The Miracle Worker" also off YouTube and it was fantastic.  Brady actually watched the whole thing and was completely engaged.  I highly recommend it to anyone with kids.

A couple of conversations with the kids...

The kids had dumped all their candy on the futon in Brady's room and did I mention there was a lot? Fortunately they know they aren't allowed to take any without asking permission.  But then I came into the room and saw Brady licking various items.
Me:"Brady, were you eating any of that candy?"
Brady:"No, I was just licking the gum to see what it tasted like."

Note to self - - don't give any of the gum to Calleigh and Aubree.  But poor Brady...I told him he couldn't have gum until he was four so I guess this was his solution.

Our back door got messed up in the wind and it's a little harder to open and close so Duncan was working on it one day.  He was on a ladder pounding a hinge or something.
Brady:"Daddy. what are you doing on earth?"

Well, the words are right just not in the right order!

Some more pictures...

The bow tie I made last week.  It lasted longer than Brady.

Cushion fort.

Calleigh has switched her favorite color from green to blue (although a lighter blue) and Brady has switched to green.  And Calaubra has unilaterally decided that Colby's favorite color is yellow.

Puzzle mania has continued.  Brady is now doing these puzzles on his own and he's very proud.  He puts it together and then breaks it apart and does it again.

We did some Geocaching this afternoon with Grandma and Grandpa came to drop off Duncan's bike (he left it at their house on Easter).  The first two we couldn't find but the third Aubree found.  Her first find!

Have a Happy Sabbath!