Easter 2011

Happy Easter, everyone!!! One of the best traditions that I picked up from my parents was Easter Bunny Saturday. Which leaves Sunday open to celebrate the resurrection. Anyway, Easter Bunny came last night.

Tom and Joe and Eme were up at 6:45am, and I woke up enough to take a picture of each child, then totally went back to bed. LOL.

Even Boxer got an Easter "Basket" (New food bowl)

And Jim woke up around 8am. And I took a picture and went back to bed again. ha!

The Easter Bunny brought the family Harry Potter Lego for the Wii, and they were pretty excited :)
I woke up for good at about 9am. And started in on chores and cupcakes. That's what I was bringing to the picnic. I made 2 cake mixes worth of cupcakes (48), and some yummy frosting. A package of dry vanilla pudding mix, and a carton of cool whip, blended together. Then I used chocolate sauce designed for sundaes, and those Praline Crunch sprinkles. They looked SO yummy. Too bad they melted in the sunshine....
We gathered up all of our stuff, and eventually headed to the park around 11 am. It took several loads and trips. I brought a few kitchen chairs to rope off the area for the hunt, and my big grill from Leslie, and a bunch of other stuff. And all the kids.

Apparently, the clown called last night and said that he had a family emergency. Um, aren't clowns supposed to be funny? That's not funny. hehe. Just kidding, Mr. Clown. I"m sorry about your emergency. Even clowns have problems.

And the bouncy castle dude showed up, but because he was gonna have to string an extension cord across the road, he packed up his castle and left. Hmpf! Well, one of the girls in the neighborhood had a tiny castle, so she brought it out.

And it totally started to blow away. The ground was WAY too hard for plastic stakes.
But we made due with what he had. There were a few footballs and baseballs that the boys threw around, and those paint stirrer sticks that I bought for the stakes (yeah, didn't work) were passed out as swords, and they LOVED those too. Unfortunately, some of the kids were breaking them in half, and we had vampire killing stakes floating around. I had to go and gather those up and dispose of them before someone get hurt... hehe.

We had some of the people from the neighborhood there, and a my friend, Nicole, brought some people from school, UTEP. See, she's involved in the Black Student Union, or something like that. And they had some money for community service, or something like that, and they wanted to do a nice Easter Picnic and hunt for a local shelter. So we combined our efforts.

And soon, people from the shelter started showing up. We had hamburgers and hot dogs, and chips, and cupcakes, and lemonade, and a few other potluck items. It really was a fun picnic. A little crazy at times, but I enjoyed it.

Maggie's son, Jacob (I call him Little Jacob.)

We had 2 egg hunts. First one was the 0-6 year olds. Most of our kids were in that one. Each kid got to pick up 12 eggs. Worked out pretty good. That way, each child got a chance to hunt for the same amount of eggs.

Jim got his eggs pretty quickly, then went around and traded up for better eggs. ROFL!

And then we had the 7+ race. Here's Eme, taking off!

It really was a fun picnic. I'd tweak a few things next year, but all in all, it was a GREAT event! Thanks to everyone who helped out! We got everything cleaned up, and loaded up, and put back where it went, and headed home.

It was about 2:30 when I got home. Kids did a few more chores, Joe went to play with Leo, Jake was still at Zach's house, and Tom and Eme were playing laptops, and Jim was on the Wii. So what did I do? Yeah, I totally took a nap. hehe. And it was SO nice!

Finally, I decided that it was time to get up. And get somewhat presentable for our next outing. hehe. We had our Waiting Families bowling party tonight! I had time to shower, but opted for a bandana and braids. Yeah, high classing it tonight. hehe.


I really need to do laundry. The little boy had no socks, so I let them borrow some from me. Jim got the leprechaun socks. ROFL!



The last 2 times we went to the Waiting Families bowling were super fun, but bringing friends was EVEN more fun. Since Terra's hubby deployed, she got to come too! And my kids had a BLAST playing with her twins. They're SO cute :) And I had a friend to chat with. And everyone was happy and nice to each other. I SO needed a good family outing. hehe. Very stress free :) Gotta like that.

They had cake and pizza and lemonade, and we did 2 games of bowling. SUPER great time :)

Eryn Bowling

Eme

Jim

Eryn (yeah, I still can't tell the twins apart, so I didn't name them - ROFL!)

Jim got new cars for Easter, and had SO much fun playing with them on the handicapped ramp near our lane.

Tom. I saw him and Jake walking back to our lane from getting shoes, and realize that they had the SAME outfit on. Gray shirt, red pants. ha!

Jake

Eme

Joe

The twins had SO much fun pushing the ball down the little ramp. One of them even ran to the people next to us, and pushed their ball down the ramp. ROFL! It was hysterical. Well, I think I thought it was more funny than her mama did. hehe.

Jake and I

I came in 1st this time, and last next time. hehe.

Jake dropped his balls. hehe.

I've got big balls?

Yeah, my kids can find things to entertain themselves everywhere they go...

We headed home at 8:30pm, after having a GREAT time bowling. Next Friday, we're having another Waiting Families event, this time at Gattitown. It's like a Chuck E Cheese or Peter Piper Pizza, but better, says Terra. She was there today for a birthday party. I'm pretty excited about going!

The little boys got Baths, Eme got a shower, and Jake and Tom did their chores. Then the little kids went to bed, and Jake and Tom and I watched a movie in my room. And I blogged. And Tom fell asleep almost instantly. Once I finish with this blog, I'm gonna go snuggle with Jake, watch the end of the movie, and go to bed.

Night, my friend. Enjoy the Sabbath tomorrow!


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Looks like a fun Easter, Sharon, my dear! Great layout :)