Easter

Easter morning started early for us, since we have 9:00 church and had to search for baskets and eat candy and get cleaned up in time for a quick picture by 8:45. We got up at 6:00 to fit it all in. Chloe was not a happy camper by this point, but then she ended up sleeping through church (our first time back since she was born), so that was a blessing. It was so good to be back at church, enjoying the talks and music - especially on Easter Sunday.

The Easter bunny did things a little different this year. Instead of written clues to find the Easter baskets, the boys had to decipher picture clues.

Here are a few of them. Some were super easy, some were a little trickier, and one was so hard it even stumped Dave. That was fun!

The baskets were in Chloe's bassinet, which she wasn't sleeping in at the time. That whole hospital thing really threw off her sleep, but now she's sleeping at least half the night in her own bed.


We never know what the boys are going to be wearing in the morning when we've been out on a date the night before. Apparently Brennan slept in Spencer's Smee costume (from the Peter Pan play) inside out. We thought he looked like an egg.

Tyler CRACKS me up! Dave and the boys got on a roll of egg jokes the other morning that went on and on...

Levi slept in and had to eat his candy quick before getting ready for church.

Funny just-woke-up face!

I gave this cute dress to a friend's baby last year, and she held onto it in the off chance that I would have a girl and she could give it back to me. Chloe's also wearing a pearl bracelet from Kristen. Cute, cute!

Levi has been coming home with me and Chloe right after sacrament meeting for the past couple weeks to avoid getting sick in nursery. His nose is finally clear after about 3+ months of constant colds.

Sunday afternoon was our Easter egg hunt. We divided the yard into 3 sections and hid 75 eggs: 15 each.

The area around the playground was for Brennan and Levi.

The lower section was for Tyler and Dallin.

I guess I hid theirs a little too well, because even I couldn't find the last couple.

And the sides were for Spencer. Of course Dave made his the hardest, but I think he found most of them.

I spent the day making cream pies, eating chocolate, and enjoying a lovely ham dinner with family. For Family Home Evening the next day we did our Resurrection Eggs (a carton of plastic eggs with symbols of the Easter story in each one) and watched He Is Risen. All in all a very successful Easter!

Butterfly egg hunt

Brennan's TK (transitional kindergarten) class has been learning about butterflies, so they had a butterfly egg hunt on the last day of school before Easter. That's one clever teacher!

They had to find the eggs that had their names written on them. That way it was educational (reinforcing name recognition), and everyone got the same amount. Great idea!

Dave's family was visiting, so I left Levi and Chloe with them and went to take pictures. I had been stuck in the house with sick kids for two days, and it felt good to get out of the house. Brennan was off school for two days, and he was hoping and praying he'd be better in time for the party. He slept in until 9:45 that day and woke up feeling great. Yay!

We love Mrs. Root! And we're really bummed that the TK program will most likely be cut due to the state's budget woes. I wanted Levi to go there in a few years!!

Here's some of Brennan's class. That blonde kid sitting next to him is his hospital roommate. His mom and I shared a room when they were born!

They were allowed to eat one piece of candy when they got back to the classroom.

I feel like I've been such a terribly uninvolved mom this year! I usually try to volunteer on a regular basis or at least help out at classroom parties, but it's been too hard with Levi and being pregnant and such. Since I was alone this time I decided to stay a little longer.

They had free play and were able to choose whatever station they wanted. Brennan had fun showing me around.

TK is such a perfect mix of preschool and kindergarten. He has a lot of fun, and he has learned so much; he's totally ready for kindergarten now!

Killing Eggs

Last week Dallin asked me, "Mom, when are we going to kill eggs?" It took me a second to realize that he was referring to dying them. Ha, ha!

We had one spill, so we don't have any yellow eggs this year. It's a good thing we don't have carpet under the table anymore.

Notice Spencer's new shark tooth necklace. He bought it in Morro Bay because his old one broke. Tyler bought one too.

They all wanted the cracked ones because they make a cool design on the inside. I guess I didn't need to be so careful putting them in the pot.

Dave offered to help by holding Chloe. Wasn't that thoughtful?

Levi refused to look at me when I took this picture. "No! Don't want picture!" So the other boys yelled and pointed at me to get him to look in my direction.

Classic Brennan smile.

They each got to "kill" 5 eggs, which seemed like a good amount. But we still have a bunch in the fridge, so perhaps I should have made deviled eggs.

So pretty! The aquamarine ones are my favorite.

Easter

We told the kids they couldn't wake us up until 7:00 Easter morning. Apparently it was a long wait for them.

As usual they had clues around the house to find their baskets, but this year the clues were riddles that they had to figure out. That was way more fun for the Easter bunny, and I think the boys liked it too.

Easter morning pictures always have to include funny bedhead hair.

And chocolatey toothy grins.

Dallin and a scary egg.

Levi can't believe he's allowed to have candy for breakfast.

Spencer's Easter egg set-up.

Brennan got a fun frog umbrella in his basket.

I always get Levi ready for church before his morning nap. He looked so cute I had to take a couple of pictures of him.

But all he wanted to do was eat candy, so that didn't work out too well.

Then we did our Easter egg hunt. Dave divided the yard into quadrants again this year, and each kid had their own section. This works out well because everyone gets the same amount with their own level of difficulty.

I don't think Spencer found all his eggs, but he did find a couple puffles left over from Tyler's party.

It started to sprinkle towards the end, so we had to finish finding the eggs quick. Brennan was happy to use his new umbrella.

My super handsome boys, right before church. Levi had just woken up, and he was pretty cranky. So I pretended to trip over a soccer ball, and that made him smile. We hosted Easter dinner for my family that night so we could show off our new floors. Oh, and we also celebrated my birthday that night. Then we enjoyed leftover ham all week - a perk of hosting Easter dinner. One interesting note about church: Dave conducted sacrament meeting, and all four speakers were finished with 25 minutes left. That meant that Dave got to speak. Thankfully he keeps his high council talks in his scripture case, and he gave the most amazing talk on the atonement. He said he was less nervous than usual because he didn't have time to get nervous. He's so awesome!