Easter Time this Year

A week after Easter Sunday Lily was still waking up every morning and nap time asking if it was Easter. Then she'd ask, "Is it Spring?" or "What Spring is it?" --This was after a month or more of having to answer the same question from her twice a day. I was kicking myself the moment I told her Easter was coming next - probably right after St. Patrick's day. My girl just loves holidays and birthdays! I guess most people do. I guess little kids just don't have a lot of extra responsibility and worry to take their minds off the next fun celebration. Oh - it is good to be a kid! :)

Easter has always been a special time for my family. My mom's side of the family always holds a big family reunion at Easter time every year. It has been too many years since I have gotten to go, but when spring comes with all it's good fresh smells -I always think of Georgia! Mmm... Breathe deep and imagine I am there. Strolling through the woods behind my grandparents house. Maybe next year!

This Easter all my family, my brothers and sister and their families, gathered at my parent's house on Saturday for an egg hunt, dinner, and family photos.

Egg hunts are the best. I've always loved treasure hunts with clues and a treat or prize at the end (Lily does too) - so what could be better than hunting out a bunch of treats and prizes in a race to get as many as you can!? Well, it was fun this year with five kids. It's always fun to see how all the different kids approach it different years. Lily did really well last year, and this year too.

Look at this focus:

Even her sweep of hair could not distract her - I had a hard time getting pictures of her she was moving so fast!

 
Her other cousins were sometimes more interested in what was inside each egg...

 ...or how pretty they were!

Or rejoicing in the beauty of the day.

Actually Audrey was pretty engrossed in the Kai-lan bubble blower Grandma bought.

 
But for the most part Lily just kept looking for more! Her borrowed basket got so full she had to go give some of her eggs to her littler cousins - stopping on the way to try (unsuccessfully) to squeeze in a few more! It was a balancing act.

In the end nobody was concerned with who got the most. They just enjoyed the bubbles and candy! I love my nieces and nephews and Lily absolutely adores her cousins! They have so much fun together!

Family Photos

My goal this Easter when my family gathered together was to get a good family picture. I was determined! There have been just too many years since we took a family photo even though we are constantly together. So many missed opportunities! The last time we took a family picture was probably at Christmas my last year of college, and our family has grown a lot since then! That photo, sadly, was taken in our front room in front of some mini blinds with my Dad's camera set too far away, before he had a digital camera, and the real kill - my mom had her eyes halfway closed in the maybe 2 attempted shots. You just can't photoshop people's eyes open. Trust me, I actually tried - it looked scary. I recently put up a family photo wall next to our staircase and went through all the family albums looking for photos for it. The studio photos were nicer quality, but the impromptu shots were usually a lot more real and entertaining!

 Anyway, I figured even if this year's photo wasn't professionally taken -- it would be better to have it than nothing! I planned who would stand where in advance, and warned everyone to plan to wear something they liked. I refreshed my memory on my camera's self-timer, determined to wait until later in the day when the sun wouldn't be casting shadows on everyone's faces, and got Mr. Squeakums, our rubber ducky, to sit on top of my camera so the kids would have a focal point to look to. Well, I couldn't be happier with how it turned out!

 
This is going up on that family photo wall as soon as I get it printed! Still going through all the individual family shots, but don't you love the new one I posted on my sidebar of my small family?

Just can't get enough family pictures :)

Easter is Officially Over

We took Lily to see the movie Hop after Easter was over, so she's probably one confused kid. It brought back her questions (Is it Easter?), and probably raised a whole bunch of new ones... We weren't going to focus too much on the tradition of the Easter bunny in our family. That was the plan, anyway. We just needed to get out of the house and it was the most Lily-friendly movie at the theater. Oh well, we'll see. She knows most movies are made up - I think...

Anyway, I finally put away the Easter basket and all the little empty plastic eggs! I don't think I will ever need to buy another plastic egg - we have enough for several children! We still have a bag of candy up on the shelf that we give out to Lily now and again. Poor kid got stuck with some strict parents! Holidays excluded, we just don't feel justified in letting her eat candy unless she eats a good amount of something nutritious. Hence - she hardly ever gets any candy. I don't really feel too bad - most of it will probably get thrown away. I'm thinking I like the idea of the Mexican Easter egg tradition a friend told me about this year. She never buys candy or plastic eggs at Easter. In her family they poke a hole in the egg, drain out the insides to make quiche, paint the eggs, and then widen the hole so it's big enough to put in coins. Then they fill it the rest of the way with flour, sugar, salt or sand, and close up the hole with some kind of little decorative head. When the kids find the eggs they break them over each others' heads to get the money out. A little messy, but sounds like fun! In my friend Connie's family they just use birdseed because it shakes off easier, and the birds can then eat it out of the grass so they don't have to clean it up. Very cool, and so much more artistic. Maybe next year we'll have to start a new tradition!