Easter

Easter celebrations began on Saturday afternoon, at my mom's Easter party.  She plans such fun parties for the kids.  She had a scavenger hunt prepared that took the kids all over the block.  They had to take pictures of them with the item that needed to be found.

Gavin and Ivy

Gavin, Ben, Josie, Lucy, Ivy, Spencer-those boys were so nice to take the little girls on their team!

After dinner, we had the Easter egg hunt.  My mom had 5 eggs for each kid, with their names written on them so they would know whose eggs were whose.  I didn't know that Ivy could recognize her name, but she definitely could that day!  There was also some wrapped candy scattered over the yard for them to collect.  The older kids had harder-to-find eggs.  They also got to go over to Bryce and Erin's and find their gift basket when they had found their eggs.  They each got a spring outfit and a swimsuit and the older kids got pickleball racquets while the younger kids got new beach towels.  After the kids were done, the adults had to wait for the kids to hide the grown-up eggs and then we got to hunt for those.  That is not necessary for my mom to do, but she is so generous to do it anyway.

Lucy and Ivy

It had been fairly nice weather but started to rain towards the end of the party so we made a quick getaway so we didn't get stuck in anything too nasty on the drive home.

We had Stake Conference on Easter morning at 10 so I told the kids there was a chance we wouldn't get to do all the hunting in the morning.  I had made orange rolls and an egg casserole the day before so all I needed to do that morning for breakfast was slice some strawberries and make some Grandma grape juice.  Justin had a priesthood leadership meeting at 7:30 so we had to wait until he got home to do anything anyway.  The kids helped with breakfast, I had them eat buffet-style at the island, I combed their hair, and got the church bag packed-basically everything but having them put their church clothes on.  We made pretty good time-they were motivated!  When Justin got home, they were able to look for their baskets.  They got Easter candy and some sort of activity book (so they could have something to do during Stake Conference).

They were so good at getting ready and so quick to find their baskets that we had plenty of time for them to find the chocolate eggs hidden around the house.  The rules are always the same: no helping from mom and dad.  They found all but one that day (one was found after church) and Brynn found the last one about a week later.

New Easter clothes...

I bought Ivy's dress online months ago and have been saving it in her closet.  I think it is so cute and springy but the back sold me.  It's hard to see but the straps cross in the back and tie together.  I loved that detail.

Brynn wore her dress for pictures in March but then had to save it for Easter.

Stockton got a new tie.  Justin got one that matches. He never wants to wear anything but a white shirt and he already had one that was perfectly fine.

Molly picked her dress out months ago.  It's not necessarily springy but fits Molly's personality to a tee.  It is very cute on her.

After Conference and lunch, we drove to Sandy for dinner with Gene, April, and Brett.  Eric and Heidi were with Heidi's family so we were by ourselves with them again.  Not complaining, but we miss the big get-together's too.  I had bought a whole bunch of eggs and the stuff to dye them but we never found a good time to do it so I took it with us and the kids dyed eggs with Grandpa and that was a fun activity while we waited for dinner.

Taking the doggies for a walk in the rain.

Ivy covered her mouth and giggled every time an egg came out of the dye.

April made a delicious dinner as always and then, instead of a traditional Easter egg hunt, they had prepared a treasure hunt since it was just our kids.  They had 20+ clues that led them all over the house, inside and out.  The last clue led them to the blanket closet where their Easter bags were hiding.  They had a blast doing that for a change and that was the end to great Easter weekend.