Our Easter Weekend...

We had a great Easter weekend. On Saturday morning, the kids got up and played for a while, then we all colored Easter eggs. They had a great time decorating them. Then we headed to Jonah’s soccer game. Thank goodness the weather was good for a little while. It was a little cool, but warmer than it’s been for a while, and it got cold and rainy the next day again. After soccer, one of Tessa’s friends invited her over to play for a little while. Just as I was about to leave to go pick up Tessa, we got a phone call of a family that wanted to come look at our house. ..in an HOUR! I wasn’t planning on showing the house and didn’t have it cleaned and in showing condition. So I asked Neil to start vacuuming and cleaning up a little while I ran to get Tessa. When I got back, all the kids pitched in to clean up their rooms, straighten things up, and I cleaned the bathrooms really quickly. The family came and looked through our house, and really liked it, but they are also trying to sell a home, so it’s kind of a waiting game. The housing market and economy aren’t very good for selling homes right now, so we really hope we can sell our home this spring or summer, so we can find someplace to rent closer to where we will be building, and get our kids registered in the other schools before school starts next year. We’ll see. Our first two homes both sold very quickly (but the economy was much better back then).

So, after showing our home, we went out to dinner for Neil’s birthday (since it’s easier to go out on the weekends, when we don’t have a crazy schedule with homework, lessons, soccer, scouts, activity days, etc.) We had a nice dinner together, and then Neil and I watched a video together once the kids were in bed. Such a great day.

I had prepared the kids Easter baskets a couple weeks early, and hid them in our bedroom closet. The basket that I had for Neil and I was pretty much empty by then, since we kept eating the candy out of it, but at least we didn’t eat the kids candy! Well, Saturday night we headed to bed and I completely forgot about putting out the baskets! I woke up at 4:30 in the morning, realizing that I hadn’t put them out! It’s a good thing I remembered, before Jonah & Clay woke up, wondering why the Easter bunny didn’t leave anything for them—Oops! So I got out of bed and gathered their baskets full of candy, bubbles, play dough, along with a new book for each of them, and took them out to the kitchen (keeping all the lights off so I didn’t wake anyone up). Then I had to unwrap the peeps to add to the basket. I just threw all the wrappers away in the kitchen, not thinking much of it. Well, in the morning , after the kids woke up and went through their baskets, Jonah saw the peeps wrapper in the kitchen garbage, and said, “HEY! The Easter Bunny left the peeps wrapper in OUR garbage can!” I said, “Huh, that’s funny. He must not have wanted the peeps to dry out, so he unwrapped them right before he put them in your basket, and didn’t have anywhere to put the wrappers, so he stuck them in our garbage can.” Funny kid. I didn’t think he would have noticed! The Easter Bunny needs to be more careful in the future!

After we got the kids ready for church (and all sugared up, ready to go SIT in church for 3 hours), we headed to church early. The week before, Neil got a call from the Stake Executive Secretary, to meet with one of the Stake Presidency before church, and they wanted me to be there too. We all know what that means…a new calling. Neil has been the assistant ward clerk for the past year or so, and we were assuming he was going to be called to be the new ward clerk. Well, we got to church, and got the kids all situated, then headed to the Stake Presidents office. Well, the counselor in the Stake Presidency came out and shook our hands, and then said that he wanted to talk to me first, alone. So as I’m walking into the office, I’m thinking…”OH CRAP! Are they calling ME to something in the Stake?!” As I’m running through my head all the callings it could possibly be, thinking that maybe our assumption was wrong. Well, the counselor just asked me if I’d be willing to support Neil in the call they were going to extend to him. I was SO relieved!! :) And then afterwards, Neil said that when I went into the office, he was thinking… “They must be calling HER to something, NOT ME…YESSSSSSS!!” Ha Ha Ha!! Well, we were right. They called Neil to be the new Ward Clerk. He is excited for the calling. He was the ward clerk in our last ward and really enjoyed the calling and working with the bishopric. He’ll do a great job. So, after our little meeting, we headed back to the chapel, and thank goodness our kids all behaved themselves.

Because it was Easter Sunday, the Primary kids were singing a couple songs during Sacrament Meeting. PJ was asked to sing a solo, and did such a great job. He has a beautiful voice and I love to hear him sing. But any time my kids perform anything, I get so nervous for them. You’d think I was the one up there singing a solo! I get shaky and my heart starts pounding, and I get short of breath. I’m glad they don’t get as nervous as I do! They all did a great job and I was really proud of them.

Then, Neil was set apart right after Sacrament meeting, and then I hurried to Primary, to be with my class, and to help Clay give his first talk. He was so excited, and did a great job too! PJ was also recognized in Senior Primary for earning his “Faith in God” award, since this was his last Sunday in Primary. Next week he’ll be going to Young Men’s & will be passing the sacrament soon. Where does all the time go?!

After church, Neil had to stay to help do tithing, and then once he got home, we had an Easter egg hunt with the kiddos, and then ate a nice ham dinner, and talked about the true meaning of Easter. Dinner was really yummy and afterwards we had Neil’s birthday party, with cake, presents, etc. (since it’s easier on the weekend, without a million other things going on). The kids had each made him a gift that was really sweet. I gave him some clothes, some treats, and a nice digital frame to put all his backpacking pictures, and pictures of our family on it, to have at his office.

Later that evening, as we were watching "America's Funniest Home Videos", Neil decided to have an Easter Egg fight. He gathered up all the plastic easter eggs from our Easter Egg hunt and started throwing them at all of us. Well, the kids quickly picked up on that, and started chucking them back. We were all laughing so hard, and had about 60 plastic eggs all over the place. Ahhh...great times!

We had such a great weekend! Spending time together, relaxing, playing, and having fun. The weekends always go much too fast!