Easterpalooza.

As usual, we took holiday-celebrating to a whole new level with Easter, making it a several-weeks-long celebration. I love love love my holidays!

First up was the Egg Hunt down at the Rec. Brooke & Joe both got to hunt eggs in the same 2 & Under group. Brooke was kind enough to help her brother hunt for his eggs (and by hunt, I obviously mean "pick them up out of the grass".) Then we headed inside for games, cookie decorating, and jumping in inflatable bouncy things. The munchkins also got to meet the Easter Bunny, which was miraculously successful. No tears from either one! We even got a really cute pic of the 3 of them - this is unprecedented, I tell ya. It was a very fun afternoon for the kiddos!

We celebrated Easter with both of our families the week before. However, we almost didn't. Brooke woke up the Saturday before Palm Sunday with a minor fever and some terrible congestion. Palm Sunday brought no relief, though the fever was still pretty mild. She was very pathetic, but was able to muster up the energy to do a little egg hunt at my parents' house and look at her basket from them. Overnight, her fever hit 104.1. A quick trip to the pediatrician revealed that she had strep. Since Joe had a low-grade fever and was starting to sound congested, we decided to treat both of them. In the meantime, my own congestion started and by Wednesday I was at the doctor with a sinus infection. So three of us were on antibiotics all week; the husband had a runny nose (making us 4 for 4 in the Kleenex department) but no drugs for him. Even though we were all still a mess, we were able to spend a few minutes with his parents before they left on their cruise (they're on the water as we speak!)

By Saturday, we were ready to embrace the final days of Easterpalooza. What Easter is complete without dying eggs? Brooke had seen an episode of Special Agent Oso where they dyed eggs, so she knew exactly what we were supposed to do. She had a ton of fun with it, while the husband and I anxiously watched/helped her with scary visions of bright red dye all over everything in the back of our heads. (We aren't the kind of parents that let their kids finger paint and play with mud; call us the Fun Police if you will, but there are plenty of fun activities that don't require an entire bottle of Dreft to clean their clothes when they are done.)

Easter Sunday was a lovely day for the Reeder family. You know, besides the lingering colds all 4 of us had and the day full of mega-tantrums via the toddler. (Um, it was so bad that the husband, who is both allergic to orange juice & not a huge fan of champagne, suggested we have mimosas with breakfast. An hour after we got up. We had that many meltdowns - during basket opening, no less! More on this current toddler situation in an upcoming post.)

We kicked off Joe's 1st Easter with some very exciting surprises from the Easter Bunny. This is his "Say what? There's a bunny that hippity hops on over and just leaves me stuff? And I don't have to do anything to get it? Is this real life?" face.

He was very happy to grab at anything he could get his hands on. All of his new things became chew toys within 2.6 seconds of being in his hands, naturally.

 See, not everything in our house is girly and pink. The Easter Bunny put a shot of testosterone in his basket with sports eggs.

Brooke was pretty excited by her basket, too. Some of the highlights: a princess t-shirt, some new PJ's, a Dora jump rope, & a "Play-Doh machine". (According to the husband, normal people don't have baskets like this. He says normal people just put candy in their kids' baskets, with an egg or two filled with change. Well, this is how my Easter baskets always looked, so this is normal to me!)

After checking out baskets, Brooke got to hunt for a few eggs...

...while Joe ate the grass out of his basket.

After breakfast (a double chocolate chip muffin for me, praise Jesus that Lent is over!) and baths, we made it to Church. And we were actually early, if you can believe that (I still can't.) The rest of the day felt pretty relaxed. We had a nice lunch out with my parents and a few of my siblings followed by a dinner with the same group at my parents' house. We capped off the day with some ridiculously yummy carrot cake I made (5 sticks of butter, baby!)

The whole Easter season was pretty great! I'm really looking forward to next year, when Brooke will finally be old enough to start explaining (in a very kid-friendly way) why we actually celebrate the season. We hope you had a fabulous & blessed weekend :)