Easter Wrap Up

We are home from our Easter trip. I took 73 photos. Oh my. There were lots of cute moments...what can I say? Those 73 actually does not even include the additional photos I took with Grandpa's camera on Saturday. (My camera alerted me the battery was low and then minutes later nothing.) Of course it was right when Madelyn was riding a horse for the first time!!! But I am getting ahead of myself with that story.

I do not even know where to begin. But stream of consciousness seems to work for me so here I go....

The weather. Clearly I was in denial when I heard whisperings of cold weather and snow because I did not pack gloves for myself even. (The children were well equipped with hats and mittens, no need to call CPS.) I thought this is Easter, it should be warm and springy. But since it was the very earliest Easter could possibly be and the Midwest has had such a rough winter I guess I should have been more ready. But it was not all that bad. In fact, for me, it was kind of fun. If we had been in Maryland surely everything would have been closed and church on Sunday, even Easter Sunday, would have been optional. Where Glamma and Grandpa live (south of Chicago) there was little accumulation and that which did accumulate melted quickly. But it's still priceless to have a photo with Easter baskets and snow.
Dye job. We enjoyed dying eggs with the Disney Princess kit. Abigail continues to be quicker than the grownups and pulled the paper holding the blue dye out from the table. That and the glitter everywhere and we made quite a mess. But sometimes the more mess means the more fun.


Magic Forest and more. On Saturday we went to the Easter Egg Roundup at The Children's Farm. We attended this annual event two years ago and we eager to visit again. The event featured farm animals of all varieties in Easter bonnets that the children could pet, brush and hold as well as a reach-in-the-coop and grab an egg (amazingly those chickens laid a bunch of hard boiled eggs.) Very cute indeed. A ride on a horse was something that two years ago we attempted but left Madelyn in tears. But she insisted she wanted to ride the horse. yeah, right I thought. But we waited our turn and sure enough she rode the big horse all around the circle. This wasn't no pony ride! My legs (or heart rather I suppose) wanted to run after her as she took off but she did great.

After the ride we went into the "Magic Forest" for an egg hunt. It was trickier to find eggs this year with the dusting of snow on the ground but they both found their own special egg. The last item of business was a visit to the Easter Bunny. I figured they could both freak out, knowing how they react to friends such as Santa Clause, etc. but we waited anyway. Well Abigail was all excited until seeing Ms. E.B. when she pedaled her little feet back to the safety of her grownups. Madelyn, to our surprise, was less shy. She shook Ms. E.B.'s paw and then said, "I am looking for Snow White!" You know we were in the Magic Forest and all. Ms. E.B. was not expecting that one I am sure but fielded the question quite well.

Oh what a night. Saturday night was the only night we ventured into the city to see friends we had not seen in a while. We went out for burgers and beers but something did not agree with Kevin. He was sick all night and into Sunday. Sadly, the poor guy spent almost all of Easter Sunday in bed. Thankfully it seemed to be something he ate since no one else seemed to get it but boy was it a miserable way for him to spend the holiday.

All dressed up. Easter just would not be complete, especially with two little girls, without completely adorable dresses. My mom found these little beauties on her favorite Ebay store and though with the cooler temps they probably should have worn sweaters I just couldn't bare to cover these dresses up at all. Surprisingly they embraced the hats and wore them for much for the day also.



We are family. While Kevin slept the ickies off we went on to Steve and Vicki's for Easter dinner. It was really a delightful family get together. The tables were set so pretty and since they have two boys (4 and 1) there was a pleasant family-friendly atmosphere. Madelyn was so looking forward to playing with her cousin Andrew and it was a nice treat for me that they could occupy one another so happily. Next year Ryan (who just turned 1!!) and Abby will be the same. I am already dreaming of the family get togethers when I can actually visit with the other grown ups while the kids are off playing. It is hard to imagine the day but we got a little glimpse of it this weekend.


Because we have so many wonderful friends and family in the Windy City we never get to see everyone we want to see and those we do see it always seems like it was such a short visit. But all in all Easter 2008 was great. These are just the highlights. I have been working on this blog entry for 2 days...it probably took as long even to skim.

Happy Easter from all of us!