Easter 2013

I'm sure everyone is already over Easter and on to playing awesome April Fool's jokes today, but I had to get a quick recap of my own up for documentation sake. It's been a great Holiday weekend having my parents in town and here's just a snapshot of we did this weekend accompanied by pictures....

Easter Egg Hunt #1
Our local nature and science center has an awesome hunt for only $7. Spots are limited and child-trampling isn't allowed. They each get the same bag of goodies and there's even a real live bunny for the children to torment pet.

Then we wandered around the center to check out the other animals before ending at the puppet show where Drew had a blast 'putting on a show'.

Easter Egg Dying
We didn't try this with Drew last year as I was just deathly afraid of getting dye everywhere, including him. This year he was an awesome little helper who listened to directions and did exactly what he was supposed to.

Church
I was so glad to have my family in town so that we could attend church on this wonderful Holiday together. And, of course, having a great excuse to dress up the little man.

Easter Egg Hunt #2
We did the obligatory front yard hunt and it was another success. The little guy loved finding what was in his eggs and putting his coins into his piggy bank!

Chalk Time
We winded down the evening on Sunday with some drawing sessions. My father is an artist and I'm sure he relished in this moment with Drew. It was adorable watching him try to draw with both Gramma and Poppa drew.

And here's a quick video of the cuteness that ensued when making noise while drawing with chalk: (make sure your volume is up around 20 seconds)

Hope you had a glorious Easter as well!

Easter. Bunny. Fail.

I wasn't the biggest fan of the mall Easter bunny the year Drew was born, but last year we luckily found an awesome venue, Pancakes with the Easter Bunny, for his 2nd year seeing the Easter bunny. It was casual, slow-paced and so easy that we vowed to return every year.

My hopes were set way too high.

Yesterday was our breakfast with Drew and it was, just like my worst fears, a nightmare. We eased into the room and found our places at our table pointing to the bunny and showing Drew how harmless he was. And then we figured we'd try to get our pictures done before pancakes hit our table. Easy, right? Um.... no. Screaming quickly ensued. We weren't even within 5 feet of the bunny when the tears started flowing and "no, no, no" could be heard a mile away. I had to even take him out of the room to calm him down it was so bad.

This is the best picture we got for Easter this year. Out of focus, not even on the bunny's lap and a sad, sad face on Drew.

Awesome.

Thankfully, the pancakes quickly helped him relax and we had a decent time with our friends who also have a toddler, Charlotte. She and Drew enjoyed stealing all of the eggs with candy and running around with their balloons. Isn't she a doll?

Photo credit: Virginia

Needless to say, I think it was just a rough year because he's only 2. Next year, he'll be almost 3 and a quarter and my hopes for a good picture should be met, right?

At least we got a good family picture, right? Ugh.

Easter Basket Blog Hop 2014

Happy April!

Remember last year when everyone linked up their Easter baskets? I'm so excited that it's happening again this year! Who doesn't love colorful baskets filled with goodies that make you smile and salivate? I know you're going to post about what you're getting the kids/pets/spouse/yourself anyway, so come join in the fun! Don't forget Easter is on the 20th this year... super late, but hopefully warmer for everyone to enjoy more!

Here are the deets: 
   Date: Wednesday, April 16th the blog hop will go live
   Rules: NONE! No kids? Link up what you're giving your pets! No pets? Link up what you splurged on for yourself!

Just grab this code to copy the image into your post, enter your info with the linky tool when it goes live and hop around to see other baskets:

<br /> <a href="www.sarahandderek.blogspot.com"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjDrEZwTL6AQg0KWN0k2J88Ks_gnin87x0seSunXpaJRFjvUXM6Zx7U9AfZ5FykV_wFPYd5lUb9D60lQn7qCfC8P9P3HEksPwS-lxCWtAkvRlyZQxCDPG9VHH8AoucDml4BWQ1exJtdpdo/s1600/Easter+Basket+Blog+Hop.jpg" height="400" width="330"/></a><br />
(The link will be live through Easter Day)

Now hop to it! see what I did there?

Easter Baskets 2013 Link Party!

Welcome to the 2013 Easter Basket Showcase link party!

<center> <a <span class="goog-spellcheck-word" style="background-color: yellow; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;">href</span>= www.<span class="goog-spellcheck-word" style="background-color: yellow; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;">sarahandderek</span>.<span class="goog-spellcheck-word" style="background-color: yellow; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;">blogspot</span>.com /><<span class="goog-spellcheck-word" style="background-color: yellow; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;">img</span> border="0" <span class="goog-spellcheck-word" style="background-color: yellow; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;">src</span>="https://lh6.<span class="goog-spellcheck-word" style="background-color: yellow; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;">googleusercontent</span>.com/-dg1L7O01ypw/UTj9iA3fpzI/AAAAAAAAIL8/q_-7z6CU4ao/s260/Easter+Basket+Final+Button-002.<span class="goog-spellcheck-word" style="background-color: yellow; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;">jpg</span>"/></a></center>

So I didn't go all overboard for Drew this year, but here are a few items that were in his Easter basket...

1. The Bunny Hop book

2. Washable Sidewalk Chalk

3. A huge Peeps Marshmallow (but surprisingly only 100 calories)

4. Gap suede moccasins

5. Green Eats cups (LOVE these!)

6. Children's Place light orange button down

NOW IT'S YOUR TURN! Show off your Easter baskets by linking up below!

Pancakes with the Easter Bunny

We decided to punt an Easter Egg hunt at a park or church this year seeing as how Drew isn't walking yet. As much as I would have enjoyed eating all of his candy, the vision of children running him over and stepping on his little fingers while he crawls to grab an egg made my heart sink. (Yes, I know. I'm not doing a good job taking the bubble wrap off of him).

So instead, I found a local pancake breakfast where the Easter bunny was going to be in attendance and signed us up! Drew didn't really mind the mall Easter bunny last year, but I thought he smelled and was kinda creepy. This bunny was much better and Drew got to actually watch him for a bit before we planted him on his lap. The pavilion was decorated with so much for Drew to look at and the food was great.

As you can see from the pictures... he really liked the bunny and was wanting to inspect her mouth! We even got a few smiles and overall he did great!

Derek tried to snap a good pic of us together seeing as how I'm generally the one behind the lens. I can't get over how handsome he looks all dressed up!

I hope your experience with the Easter bunny goes as smooth as ours did. We definitely saw our share of screaming and crying children throughout breakfast.

Easter Link Party Heads Up!

Are you proud of what's in your Easter Baskets this year? 

Want to show it off?

I have your solution.

On Thursday, March 28th, I will be hosting a link-up party for everyone to show off what's in their Easter baskets! Mark your calendars and start working on that post now! 

Don't have kids? Show us what's in your pet's basket.

Don't have pets? Show us an Easter Basket decoration you have around the house.

It's open to all and will be a party to explore other blogs and gain new readers to yours!

Just insert the image above with the html code here on your post: 

<center> <a href= www.sarahandderek.blogspot.com /><img border="0" src="https://lh6.googleusercontent.com/-dg1L7O01ypw/UTj9iA3fpzI/AAAAAAAAIL8/q_-7z6CU4ao/s260/Easter+Basket+Final+Button-002.jpg"/></a></center>

 Questions?

Easter Weekend Recap

We generally have family in town for Easter and this year my parents and brother were in town for the Holiday! Although I wish it had been in the 60's or 70's, I'll take some 40 degree temps after this winter. It just means we had to do more indoor activities. First up was baking with Gramma! 

Then we did some obligatory egg dying.

On Easter morning we opened baskets and then headed to church.

Drew got to hold a live bunny at church!

Drew also participated in 2 egg hunts, one with the neighborhood and the other in our backyard. I decided to only take videos on the camcorder this year instead of pictures but accidentally deleted them both. UGH. (Does this mean I'm already becoming an old fogie that complains about how confusing technology is?!) At least there was some sunshine to enjoy on our neighborhood walks we took to burn our 5,700 calories, delicious Easter meal!

And last but not least, the little man indulged in lego building a lot with Poppa.

I posted this pic on Instagram but had to put it here as well. (Sorry mom, don't kill me) Our kids napped a lot but my parents even snuck naps in as well. Hey, grandkids are tiring when you're over 60!

Hope you had a wonderful Easter as well!

Easter 2020

Easter is such a favorite Church day for me. Getting all dressed up and hearing about the miracle of the day is so glorious and I love it. So naturally, I made my family get all dressed up just to watch church on the TV. I cried and we held hands and we sang and it was as good as we could do for Easter at home.

I was NOT going to settle for my parents eating in their own home 15 minutes away from us on such a special day. So we set up a table and chairs and socially distanced a delicious Easter meal. They brought their own food and even though we couldn't hug them it was wonderful having them on the patio with us!

Our street decided to have an egg hunt that afternoon at the same time! We all did our own hunts in our own yards and Will actually did great! I didn't know what to expect with him but he grabbed several eggs and tossed them in his basket!

He is risen indeed.

Happy Easter

Oh and I had to include Drew's school pictures with live bunnies that we just got back. They included him in the group that he wasn't supposed to be in first, hence the orange Thomas the Train tshirt on the left. Then, the 'real' picture is on the right where he's all nice and dressed up. Of COURSE he is smiling and happy in a tshirt instead of dressed up with his hair done. I wish I could cut out his face and put it on the dressed up picture!

I also can't believe they got those bunnies to sit still for the entire school. Poor things probably were groped and grabbed more than they ever thought they would be in their entire life.

Lastly, I was so excited to get Drew's basket together this year. Last year he was only a couple months old and way to young to really enjoy anything out of a basket. We probably went a bit overboard for a little Holiday such as Easter, but it was really just a few items we'd been wanting to get him anyway. What little boy doesn't love a good dump truck?

Also thanks to both sets of grandparents for the toys and books you both got for Drew for Easter!

Drew's 1st Easter Egg Hunt

I'm 95% sure most of you are tired of reading Easter posts within the blogging world, but I have just ONE more! I had to include our egg hunt fiasco event that we attended this past weekend. It was CRAZY. Seriously. Pure chaos.

So this year, I wanted to attempt an egg hunt with Drew. Knowing that he still topples a lot when walking, I figured a large hunt where kids were separated by age would be best. At least the 3 years olds wouldn't be too much bigger than him. I figured a 5 year old would just bull him over and not care!

So I found a 100,000 egg hunt that had a 2-3 age category but took really any kids under 3. When we got there, I estimate that nearly 4,000 people were already there. With Derek's anxiety starting to set in, we quickly registered and made our way to his area only to hear the hunt was being pushed back 15 minutes. This is where it got sticky. Kids were getting crazy. They were becoming very antsy as they could see all of the eggs and parents were quickly following. It was near lunch time. And nap time. A dangerous combination. Not to mention probably another 1,000 people had showed up.

So we waited. And more people came. And I began to get nervous despite Drew, on the other hand, watching balloons, eating popcorn and having no issues just hanging out.

You know in the Hunger Games preview where they are counting down the beginning of the game and your heart is pounding as you know what's next in store for the main character? That happened to me as the announcer began 5, 4, 3, ....

I bolted. I scooped up my kid and ran. My motherly instincts knew we would have 4 seconds to ensure he got an egg so I ran. I became 'that' parent, but to about 1/8th of the degree other parents were.

And I then stood up and saw the madhouse. Parents were literally dragging their kids in order to gather as many eggs as they could. Apparently there were a few 'golden' tickets in which you would win iPad's and other good prizes if you found those. It really felt like a 'hunt' in the truest meaning of the word. Drew was literally on the ground just long enough to grab those few eggs. Then I noticed that parents were brushing dangerously close to him as they sprinted by and I was done. He wouldn't know he only had a few eggs and at that point, his safety was my only concern. 

Once we got to the side where daddy was with the camera and bloggie, we were able to breath and look through our findings. 

And then the boys walked around a bit while mommy gawked in disbelief at how crazy some parents are.

And then we went home and enjoyed a quiet little hunt in our front yard where no madness could ensue.

Next year, we will not be back. Instead, I hope to find a much smaller scale hunt that Drew can actually enjoy and not be run over by crazy 30 and 40 year olds. Until then, I hope everyone else had a wonderful Easter!