Easter 2014

The week leading up to Easter this year was so meaningful and religious.  We started out with a family night on the atonement and resurrection of Christ, and did a cute Easter egg activity that coincided with bible verses and symbols (the cross, a rock, empty egg, nails, etc.).  The kids were so cute and knew more than we realized.  Kate was so absorbed with Jesus this week, too, after her nursery lesson from Heidi about the resurrection.  Every single day, she asked to watch the bible videos on LDS.org by asking, "Can I watch Jesus was in a cave?"  It was so sweet to watch her excitement.  Both Zachary and Kate kept saying things like, "We thank thee that Jesus was resurrected so we can be with Him again" in their prayers.  

 Saturday morning, Brady was home long enough to decorate eggs.  I'm so glad he's good at this stuff because every year, all I think about my eggs is "fail"!  We got a "mess free" kit and decided that's a joke.  There's no such thing as mess free egg decorating.

 That night, we set out the baskets and a trail of candy inside eggs.  We worried because before bed, we neglected to tell Zachary not to get up and look for the eggs until we were with him and Kate was up.  We figured he would remember that from Christmas, but he wakes up so early on holidays, and we weren't sure what he would do.  Brady woke up all night at every sound, sure that Zac was up and on the prowl.

Zac came in at 5:15am, and said, "It's Easter!  Can we go see our baskets?"  Brady told him it was too early, and that he needed to go back to bed.  He also told him to make sure he didn't go in the front room without us.  Zac said, "Okay, Dad.  Hey, do you think that maybe the Easter bunny brought me a white shirt and tie?"

Hahaha.

 6:15am finally rolled around, and we woke up crazy-haired sister...

 ...and went on the hunt.

 We try to give a religious gift with the baskets.  "Frozen" ended up in the baskets this year because it arrived late for Kate's birthday.  When the kids saw the movie, they jumped up and down and squealed, "FROZEN!!!!!"  Kate added, "FROZEN: A TALE OF TWO SISTERS!"  That's hysterical to us: it's the book's title that she requests almost every single night.

 Yum, peeps:

 I love that Zac arranged the baskets so "Frozen" was in his basket and the scripture stories were in Kate's basket.

 Displaying their new church outfits.

 Prepare for too many pictures of my kids.  I love Easter shots so much.

 Zachary looks so uncomfortable here:

...while Kate looks uncomfortable here:

 Displaying her "bootiful" dress:

 The melt-my-heart pics:

 No picture gets taken anymore without a bribe for a "silly pose".

 Church was a little nuts.  I played in three musical numbers during Sacrament meeting, plus the congregational singing, and then I taught my Sunday school class (with 18 kids!).  Thankfully, Brady was in our ward for Easter, so he was able to help out a lot.  We came home and got ready for Easter dinner with the Hadleys.  I took a quick snapshot of my failed angel food cake, which was supposed to be part of a trifle.  Every year, I make a joke about how Jesus has risen, but I can't get my rolls to rise.  This year, my rolls and my cake died and never recovered.  I really don't know what I do wrong, and I don't care enough to experiment again and again for things I make once a year.  Maybe this pic will convince me to work up the gumption to care and try again.

I made a killer carrot cake last week for a friend's surprise party, so luckily enough, I had all the ingredients I needed to whip up another.  We had a lovely dinner (hopefully the last holiday dinner I host at this house!), and then met up with about 8 other families for an Easter Egg Hunt at the golf course.  Perfect day!

I love Easter.  I feel like it should be my favorite day of the year for religious reasons, but it's my 2nd favorite day of the year because I really, really love Christmas.  I love that Easter doesn't have to compete for religious attention compared to Christmas, though, and I love that my kids were enthralled with the religious aspects of the holiday this year.