Don't Know if you Heard....

... but Easter came this year.

Last year I vowed that we would never have a thrown together Easter again.  I was bothered by the fact that we spent so little relative time on Easter compared to Christmas, when each holiday is centered around one of the two greatest events in history.  Don't you think the resurrection of Christ should get just as much celebration as his birth?  One without the other wouldn't have made much of a difference, but the sum of both of them together is perhaps the most powerful combination known.

Vows don't seem to hold as much weight as they did in biblical times, however.

And we had ourselves a very thrown together Easter again this year.

*Sigh*

Good thing we can try again next year!

McKenzie spent Easter-Eve in soap shavings and various pocket knives carving a bunny she set out as a gift for the Easter Bunny.  She had read a novel called Becoming Naomi Leon the night before in which the main character (a young girl such as herself) had a talent in carving soap into beautiful creations.  The book inspired McKenzie to devote a few hours to this project.

Pretty good, huh?  I was surprised so proud of her.  She then took a few seconds to throw together a little note.  If only she would apply her slow and careful carving hands to her handwriting... we could go places.

Then again, I'm a bit of a perfectionist... so maybe she could teach me a few things about just 'getting it done'.

Easter morning brought happy surprises.  And the Easter Bunny got my memo that we didn't want much candy this year.  Instead, the kids found several puzzle pieces in their Easter eggs that, when combined together and assembled, gave great clues to where they could find their prize.  I totally should have taken pictures of the final puzzles because, that Easter Bunny did an awesome job in her his illustrations!  The kids followed the clues to two different puzzles and found Duke hats (to tie to North Carolina) and flip flops (to tie to Miami) in the end.

Another hit of Easter came from Grandma.  Who knew three jumping chicks could bring so much joyful laughter!  (And, I have to admit, I was laughing at them, too.)

After church I shuttled the kids outside to snag some pictures of them in their Easter clothes.  Bribes may have been involved... and I guessed wrong at where the good light would be, so the pictures aren't great, but they're good, and the kids didn't dissolve into a puddle of tears by the end so... success.  And... I realized later that I do have another child that should have probably been included in these.  Hm.  Sorry TK.  Next year, I guess. (Besides, I may have had to choose between Miles and Timothy because I'm not entirely sure that Miles would have cooperated had Timothy been close enough to him to be in the same picture...) 

Here... we'll throw in a random picture of TK, too, because he's just so adorable.

Grandma had taken McKenzie out the week before to find an Easter dress for her and, boy, did they have a great time.  I think it was the highlight of Grandma's entire visit for both her and McKenzie.  (Holding Timothy might have been a close second for Grandma, though.)  McKenzie came back with two different outfits.  "The boys each got three things," Grandma justified.  "A shirt, a tie and pants... so McKenzie needed three things too.  A dress, a skirt, and a shirt."  Grandma told me later that a common phrase used during their shopping trip as they pulled things from the racks was, "Ohhhh, this looks very Miami."  So, behold... McKenzie's Miami Dress:

The boys got Miami shirts, too (ie: short sleeved), and seemed just about as thrilled as they ever are with new clothes.  Which is somewhere between thrilled and indifferent.

Happy (Two-Weeks-After) Easter!