Easter

I was reflecting this year on why I am really not into the Easter bunny.  I actually have wonderful memories of hunting for eggs as a kid.  My parents were really smart about it- everybody came downstairs to find their basket and empty carton in a different room, and you had to search that room until you filled up your carton again.  That way the eggs could be hidden on your level (easy or hard), and no one lost any eggs (in theory).  So why didn't I want to do that with my kids?

I mean, it has quite a bit to do with how much the silly stuff distracts from the real meaning of the holiday, but I'm not nearly as against Santa Claus.  I think Santa and all of the presents still has a good spirit to it though- we focus on thinking of others and giving to others.  But why should I spend Easter morning, after the kids have had between one and four egg hunts in the last week, doing yet another round of searching for candy?  My kids do not need any more candy- we still have Christmas candy, for crying out loud!

Anyway, the egg hunt with family the day before is always great.  I don't mind egg hunts as social activities on days other than Sunday.

Christopher grew up with a trampoline, and he would really love one for our family, but our kids are just going to have to enjoy them at their cousins' houses.  Because when I look at this picture, I just remember the statistic that the chance of an accident on a trampoline goes up by 75% once two or more people are jumping at the same time.

Moms are so mean sometimes.

Daddy was more than happy to get up there with them.  But once the rest of the cousins had run off, he lay down for a nap.  Christopher has been putting a lot of hours in renovating our newest townhouse lately, so he was looking to relax.

And, one by one, our kids wanted to snuggle with him.

Did I mention Kaitlyn lost her second tooth?  Those are BIG events to her.  She wouldn't stop talking about how wiggly it was for weeks, and went through multiple drafts on her tooth fairy note.

I like this cutie :).

My sister-in-law brought the parachute again to keep the kids occupied while the adults spread the loot out on the lawn.  I just love how intense Tyler gets!

There were so many eggs (Grandma always goes overboard!) that they ended up just sprinkling everything across the grass.  "I felt like I was feeding chickens!"

Jasmine, as usual, was absolutely thrilled about it all.

As we were dozing off that night, I was rationalizing what we would say to the kids if they noticed the Easter bunny hadn't come to our house.  Last year tried to go without, and told them he would come while we were at church.  This year I figured we could tell them that he knew our eggs weren't dyed yet, or that he knew we had already hunted for eggs.  Of course, Christopher has always talked about the year that the Easter bunny brought a Nintendo.  His mom found a good deal and wanted to give it to the family, but didn't want it to just be a random thing that appeared one day.

So when we came downstairs that morning, I found a surprise at the bottom of the stairs, with a note from the Easter bunny that we should use it to play some Easter songs.

I can't tell you how happy this made me.  Our old digital piano broke a month ago, and it has been a long month without it.  I hadn't played much for years, but Kaitlyn taking lessons has kinda brought me back into playing too.  And then one day, for no reason at all, our piano made a hissing, staticy sound when we turned it on.  And when we pressed a key, it made an angry, hissing, staticy sound.  When we called up a repair guy, he told us that basically most of the digital pianos out there are meant to last about 5-10 years.  (Seriously?)  So our 8 year old piano was just dead.

We do like having a digital one, though.  It is always in tune, and it has a volume button.  This one even came with headphones.  So we realized that we either needed to commit to another thousand dollars every decade or so, or spend a bit more and get one meant to last a lot longer.  We've spent a lot of time debating that over the last month, and frankly procrastinating dropping all the money on something that should have still be working in my mind.  Grr.

Anyway, this thing has been a world of difference so far.  Christopher keeps mentioning that he isn't a piano person, and didn't expect to be impressed, but can't believe how awesome this one is.  Kaitlyn and I have been playing constantly all week!  It really is wonderful therapy for me, too.

Unfortunately, we only got the piano two days before her piano recital.  All of the rest of her practicing for this one has been on our awesome neighbor's piano or during her lesson itself.  But I think she still did a great job!

You can see the video of it here.  The piano store she performed at is running a contest, and whoever gets the most views on their video wins a free piano.  I can't imagine that happening, but she liked dressing in costume for her song to make it more fun!

Back to Easter morning, the one tradition I do love is Easter dresses.  I want it to feel even more special than the average week at church- and wow, our choir made it amazing this year.  Anyway, these were actually really simple to put together.  Kaitlyn and I liked this knit fabic at the store, and so I just whipped up the pair of dresses and happily found there was enough for a skirt for me, too.

I love how much Kaitlyn enjoys matching her sister.  I was worried that with a four year gap, she might not be interested in her baby sister, and that might happen someday.  But for now, both of the older kids practically follow her around to play with her.

Let's see, what else have we been up to?  Kaitlyn has been student of the week this week.  She has been over the moon about that.  She told me it took a lot of work to be chosen (since you have to be quiet and attentive!) but she was so excited she could hardly contain herself.  She got to make a poster about herself to hang on the door all week, bring in a "sharing item" each day to tell the class about, and today she got to bring in her favorite book for the class to read together.  I think her favorite day was bringing in Jasmine for her "sharing item", though her adored stuffed animal Muffin might have been a close second.

Oh, and I made this coat closet this week!

Please pay no attention to the laundry all over the background.  I'm not entirely finished yet- it needs a back, but that wouldn't fit in my Pilot with kids in tow.  But this is a huge improvement anyway.  We used to have a couple of coat racks on the wall, but the hooks were too close together for backpacks.  Once we had two backpacks up there, along with winter coats and my purse and everything else, the kids gave up and started just dropping their backpack on the floor, since it would just slide there anyway.  Not how I want the entrance from the garage to be.  These are basically skinny, open lockers, and I do lose some space in my laundry room making it, but now they can hang everything up!  And now my purse is up high on top, out of the reach of my toddler!  (She adores taking out all of my credit cards and money.) I had fun breaking out my old wood-burning tool to write their names on the front.  I might put it up on casters soon, so that I can wheel it out of the way to do laundry, but overall, I'm just happy everything is off the floor.

And now, it looks like I need to go do some laundry . . .