Hoppy Easter

The great thing about living close to family is that you always have plans for the holidays.  But when my parents and sister decided to be in Utah for Easter this year, it left us solo for the first time in our 9 years of being married.  (PLEASE FAMILY DON'T TAKE OFFENSE TO THIS NEXT STATEMENT BECAUSE WE LOVE SPENDING TIME WITH YOU....I AM LOOKING AT YOU LEIGH) But I was actually looking forward to spending a nice, quiet holiday with my growing little family in our new house.  And we were lucky enough to go to the beautiful blessing for baby Knox that morning and spend time with friends that are like family to us.

Can I just tell you how excited I was to dress my girls alike?  Like way more excited than I thought I would be about it.  This is just the start girls.  Yes, looks like I am gonna be that mom.


So I don't really agree with the whole "Easter Bunny" thing.  I first voiced my concerns in this post a few years ago.  I just think the whole thing is weird.  A giant bunny hiding eggs?  I feel like I can't talk about this to my children with a straight face.  So this year I just decided to not say much about the Easter Bunny and just let Chase believe what he wanted to believe.   

Since we left much too early to do any baskets or eggs in the morning, we decided to do the egg hiding while the girls napped and Chase went on a hike with Matt.  So I hid all the eggs and then was relaxing on the couch when 3 things occured to me.  1.  It was only 2 o'clock and Mia wouldn't be up for at least another hour.  2.  Half of the easter eggs were filled with chocolate.  3.  It was about 80 degrees outside.  I was about to run out and gather all 40 or so eggs, when Chase ran in, went immediately to the back door and squealed that the Easter Bunny had come.  

So I decided to finally say something about the Easter Bunny.  "What was the Easter Bunny thinking hiding a bunch of chocolate outside when it is so hot?  JEEZ!"  So we made a quick plan that Chase would find all the eggs, we would put them in the fridge (as they were already becoming a melting mess), then Dad would rehide them when Mia woke up and they could do another hunt together.  And by the way Chase, don't tell Mia that you already collected all the eggs without her.  (And I have decided that the only way to be sure to have your kids tell the other something is to tell them that it is a secret and NOT to tell the other.  Good thing Mia was too young to really get it)

So we did round two of Easter egg hunt at 3:30 followed by the scavenger hunt for their baskets.  Mia's delight at her pez reaffirmed my decision to majorly tone down the easter baskets this year.

I threw together the most delicious Easter dinner in about 45 minutes, thankyouverymuch.  Thanks, of course, to the wonderful people at Trader Joes, without whom my family might never actually eat.  Note to self for next year:  Do not go to TJ's 30 minutes before close the night before Easter.  They were out of many essentials, including potatoes.  Good thing I already had some on hand.  I am known for my last minute grocery shopping.  Wanna know other bad times to go to the store?  Christmas Eve, New Year's Eve, and Thanksgiving.  I speak from personal experience.

We rounded out our day with some S'mores where I made good use of the Reese's eggs. 

Now let's hope the kids don't notice that all their chocolate has mysteriously disappeared.  I guess I could just blame this on the Easter Bunny.