Easter 2013

This has been an Easter to remember. I've already posted about our egg hunt, so let me talk about just this weekend.

Thursday afternoon Rachel's Terry Grandparents arrived and brought her home from day care a few hours early. Matter of fact, I'm pretty sure they got there just after she woke up from her nap. Apparently she was crying really hard because another little boy had stolen her shoe. Ha!

We had a wonderful evening playing until she went to bed then the adults stayed up to visit.

Friday I was able to leave work for a half day and come home early to begin cooking. We were having special guests with us on Saturday and I didn't want to have to do everything last minute.

It was another evening of fun with Rachel then adults visiting. Grandma brought out part of Rachel's Easter presents, which included this "soap paint". It's finger paints you can use in the tub and it turns into soap! Rachel enjoyed this each night her grandparents were here, and thankfully they used it all up before they left!:

Saturday our special guests arrived: Rachel's Great Aunt Connie, Great Uncle Paul and Great Uncle Barry! They drove over from Richmond, Indiana and spent the afternoon with us. Rachel was (in my motherly opinion) unusually uncooperative and wanted nothing to do with anyone but Grandma. I felt bad, I had really wanted her to be able to spend some time with Connie and play with her since Connie sends a lot of wonderful gifts and ideas and they rarely get to see each other. She played with her in small doses, but overall she seemed out of sorts that there were people in the house she doesn't know very well. Normally she'll warm up to people after they've been here for a while. Regardless, we made the most of it and had a wonderful day!

We started the visit by coloring Easter eggs, which I hadn't done since I was a kid. I think we did pretty well, considering this is the first time I've ever read the instructions on how to do this. My parents always did it for me!

Look at that! I'm in a photo! (I should try to have someone else take the camera more often).

Connie brought over a gorgeous present for Rachel for Easter:

Like I said, she was pretty uncooperative so the only photo I got of her from the front in her dress was this one. It's an adorable pink tea dress with flowers. It's also a 3T so it's just a bit too big now, but she'll be able to wear it all summer long! Thank you again so much Connie!

Grandma brought out this neat badminton set she had brought and tried to get Rachel to play with everyone:

After our guests left Rachel snuck into my room and started looking through one of the photo albums I have from our wedding. This was too adorable not to share:

(What you're not seeing are the 7 pillows I had put on that bench Rachel threw on the floor so she could create this pose. Regardless, adorable!)

Next comes Easter Sunday. Jason and I had actually picked out an adorable Easter Dress. I was not disappointed when I was able to get this photo:

The dress is still clean. Her bow is still in her hair. Her shoes are on the right foot. And she's actually looking at the camera and almost smiling!!! I caught her face in between expressions, but at least I caught this! By the time Geri and I picked her up from the children's area at church, she had water down her front, the bow in her hair was missing and she looked a mess. I didn't care. I managed to get this picture, which was worth everything :o) She's getting so big!

We got back from church and Geri and David packed up and headed out. Once they left, all 4 of us (including Monty) took a much needed nap. It has been another absolutely gorgeous day! So we took a trip to the park. I LOVE that we have a play ground so close! We get exercise, she wears herself out, and lots of memories are made.

Also a little announcement....we just found out that we are going to be the recipients of an awesome deal from Craigslist....

We were hoping to pick this up today, but the guy is going to take it apart and meet us, so we have to wait until next weekend. Regardless, I've made arrangements to pick this up on Saturday. I know we have a great park up the street, but we just found out a few weeks ago that the family that moved in behind us has a daughter that's just a few weeks older than Rachel. Sometimes we don't want to walk to the park, we like to play in our backyard. Unfortunately, there's not a lot to do and we don't want to put in a big swing set. This, however, was an awesome price and in great shape. We should have some photos of her in it for me to post next week!

Finally, this last photo is one I took a while ago but just came across again this afternoon. One night Jason gave Rachel her bath and when he put her pajamas on, decided to make her look ridiculous.

If they were pulled up any higher, that diaper she's wearing would be really uncomfortable.

Happy Easter everyone!