Easter Party

Whew, that was about 2,000 pictures I just uploaded.  Anyway, Easter festivities continued Saturday afternoon with a party at the Stewart's church.  The kids were divided into age groups and they rotated through different centers.  Cupcake center, craft center, Easter Bunny center, and LIVE duck center.  Guess which one Mommy was most excited about.  Anyway, Josie loved the cupcake (duh), skipped crafts all together, wanted to look at the ducks and quack at them but not actually touch them, and wanted to chit chat with the Bunny and show him things, but not actually touch him either.  Liv was pretty much the same except that she did craft, did hold the ducks and did sit with the Easter Bunny...see, exactly the same.  The egg hunt was next.  The kids were sent to different outside areas to hunt eggs.  Liv was out the door so fast that I didn't even have a chance to get egg hunting pics captured on film.  Josie was pumped up to "fine heggs" because we had been explaining it to her all day.  When it was time she went crazy without stealing eggs from other kids, so we'll call that a success.  Josie was hilarious with the Easter Bunny and the eggs outside--again, wanted to chit chat but no touching.  Everyone went back inside to open their eggs and we were almost out of there when the announcement was made.  Yes, that's right--the baby ducks were available for adoption.  You had to adopt them in pairs so they wouldn't lonely and free with your duck adoption was duck food.  Liv just knew she would die without a duck and we just knew the duck would die shortly after meeting our lab when we got home.  After breaking Liv's heart (actually, she took it well) we were off to dinner.

The Denlers Dye Eggs

I really gotta put a little more forethought into the order I upload these pics.  Now, you're looking at the final product and not seeing the process and I don't feel like redoing them, so here they are!  Anyway, Friday was the big day for dying eggs.  Liv and I look forward to this from the time we buy our kit every year until we do it.  This year we went with the glitter eggs and also got a set of egg paint markers.  Josie was joining in on the fun for the first time in her life.  We moved the event outside so I wouldn't be as worried about a mess.  Kevin came home early from work to help us out and even Ryleigh got here just in time to help.  Josie just played with the water mostly and wanted to use the egg spoon thing to stir.  Liv picked out the egg colors and used the white crayon to add polka dots.  After the eggs were dry Liv and Ry took turns glittering up the eggs--an impressive sight.  But these were only batch one of the eggs to be dyed.  Saturday while Josie was napping Liv and I boiled up a second dozen to big girl decorating.  We got fancy on these eggs--for example, we made grass and sky eggs by holding egg halves in green and blue water.  Then we used our paint to add suns and flowers.  Other eggs were polka dotted, I made a family egg with our name on it and stick figures of the whole family, and Liv made an egg that says "I love my mom".  Precious girl!  All in all, fun was had by all...except when we all had to scrub out fingers to the bone to get the dye off!

A Funny Thing Happened on the Way Home from the Ballpark

So, Thursday night Liv and I went to see her cousins Cole and Jordan play baseball and softball.  I knew there was a storm acomin' but my trusty friends at weather.com told me in their hour by hour report that it wouldn't be here until after 11pm.  This was plenty of time to watch ballgames and get home and also I thought that this was a just a Spring thunderstorm.  Wrong.  "This" was actually a tornado and it was moving faster than the good folks at weather.com good keep up with, apparently.  Around 9:30 they called the ballgames due to lightning, and even though this should have been warning enough to head home, I felt led to go to McD's on the way home for a quick dinner.  My brother-in-law Rick and his son Cole came with us.  About 2/3 through my cheeseburger, the employees begin shrieking and running to lock the doors.  They heard a weather report that the tornado was just miles away and headed in our direction.  This confirmed minutes later by the deluge of rain, hail, and wind.  Sadly, I was forced to abandon unfinished cheeseburger and go with my family and the restaurant employees to the men's bathroom to weather the storm.  I have this general idea that nothing really bad will happen to me (knock on wood, right?) so I was keeping it comical whilst trying to focus not too much attention on the urinal.  I snapped a quick picture of the family en route to men's bathroom--Liv is her mother's child!

The other picture is of Josie and her new fave activity--mothering.  She gets all of her favorite dolls, and stuffed animals, and Kenzie together on the couch and covers them with blankets to tuck them in for naps.  It's pretty sweet.  Josie's cheeks are stuffed with candy, which is why she looks a little bit like a squirrel.

Two years in the life of Josie

Man, I was gonna try to pick a few pics of Josie during lots of different baby phases, but that was nearly 6 hours ago--I got sucked into the vault of photos that is my hard drive--it is nearly impossible to just pick a few, so while I don't feel like this is nearly enough pics to encapsulate Josie's 2 years I'll stop now..

Josie's Birthday Party

Well, if a picture is worth a thousand words there are about 19,000 words below that talk all about Josie's party.  You can ask anyone who was there--the party was a qualified success.  We were going for a "garden party" so we had bright colors and flowers and butterflies and lantern light things.  Kevin grilled hot dogs and hamburgers and 25 of our closest friends and family came over to celebrate Josie turning 2.  I was so bust playing the hostess that I didn't spend a ton of time with Josie, but I know she had a blast.  Her cousin Jordan played with her a lot and so did Olivia.  All the kids had fun and the play options were plentiful enough that everyone always had something to do.  I set up hopscotch squares, bubbles, sidewalk chalk, and we have the swingset and trampoline.  Josie was most excited about her "flutterfly" cake and was sure to point it out to everyone at the party.  By the time everyone left and we took Liv to her classmates party, hung out at the Boardwalk, went on a bike ride, and got cleaned up Josie passed out.  The next day Josie asked if we could have her happy birthday party again--if she had enough fun at the first party to ask for another one, then that's good enough for me--gonna put another point in the awesome mom column, and call this birthday done!  Josie got tons of great clothes and books and she loves her new doll, so thanks to everyone who came and gift gave--not that that was a requirement for attendance!  And, in closing, I just remembered that I already have thank you notes in the mail--point 2 for awesome mom column!