Wordless Wednesday: Favorite Easter Memories

Do's and Don't's for Next Year's Egg Hunt

Do:  Bring a few empty eggs with you to the store to make sure your non-candy items will fit.  I found tons of great non-candy fillers at the German toy store but alas, my eyes were too big for my stomach eggs and most of the toys had to go into the Easter baskets Sunday morning.  No biggie.  BUT can I just say that hiding little puzzle pieces in the eggs and then putting the puzzles together at the end of the hunt is TOTALLY going to be a family tradition!  (Brilliant idea I found on Pinterest)

Don't:  Assume your small children will totally understand the concept of splitting the loot evenly at the end of the hunt.  They're very into "mine" and "yours" lately, but at the same time didn't seem to understand that there was pretty much two of everything.  SOSTOPFIGHTING.  I mean, maybe next year (or in future years) I should buy two colors of eggs to make it more clear who's treasures are who's.

Do:  Have the hunt right after nap (and on Saturday when there's less going on) so everyone's well rested.  And also to draw out the fun even longer.  Cause duh fun is what it's all about!  And no one's gonna have fun when Momma's barking orders while slamming an egg hunt in between church and a big ham dinner.  (I actually did do it on Saturday, yay for me being smart.  This time ha.)

Don't:  Underestimate the generosity of the grandmothers.  Think: bigger baskets next year to hold the surplus. We're talking not only did both Gigi and Gram send AWESOME goody boxes, but our neighbor Mrs. Ehman also brought the girls each a toy and Oma surprised them with a mini-egg hunt on Sunday!  We have goodies coming out our ears people!

Do:  Remember that part of the special-ness of the holidays (for children AND husbands) is the sugar.  It's okay if they have one (or two or *gasp* three!) treats a day for Easter week(end).

So Don't:  Cringle about how everyone's sugar intake is surely weakening their immune system and now everyone's going to get really sick aaaaand... calm down.  You can hide the candy from the kids and start eating normal again next week.  Now go eat a cookie with your coffee and consider it your CHILL PILL.  If the kids get sick at least they will have been happy doing it ;o)  (I have a grudge against sugar, can you tell?  Sugar is bad.  But it's a special treat and that's okay, even for this hippie!)

Do:  Expect your girly-girls to make you get the eggs hidden under or near anything remotely prickly or branchy (and they count grass as prickly.)  Pansies.

Don't:  Forget to check more thoroughly when hiding the eggs to make sure there aren't any hidden thorn branches in said grass.  So I guess I should be thankful the pansies made ME get those eggs ;o)  At least I was the only one prickered by my stupidity.

Do:  Enjoy the great big smiles and belly laughs that your (and the grandmas') thoughtfulness brings.  I never knew being The Mom during the holidays can be just as much fun as being A Kid.  I remember as a kid going to sleep the night before Easter so excited about wearing my special Easter dress the next day and so so SO excited about the basket of candy that Mom always set out at each of our places at breakfast.  I think I was just as giddy this year as I set the breakfast table full of fun for my own little Monkeys.

A big thanks to Mom and Toni.  

Seriously ladies, your care packages make every holiday that much more special.  I can't wait till we can celebrate some of these little days together.  But until then, know that you are thought of and appreciated for the love you put into our care packages.  Some of the things you come up with to make the holidays special I would never have thought of... I'm so glad I have you lovely ladies backing me up and making these special days ROCK for my girls.  And also, stay tuned for LOTS more pics coming soon to a facebook near you.  It's on the to-do list for today (or tomorrow!) Love ya's!!!

Happy Easter!

I Really Care about Care Packages

We got our Easter package from my Mom yesterday.  It came at just the perfect time... and it included tons of great goodies for the girls (and chocolate!!!).  But most important, to me, it included plastic Easter Eggs.

I was lamenting to Mom last week about the lack of plastic Easter eggs around here.  I think we talked the day after I had been at the BX looking for eggs and they didn't have any.  And I was talking to an employee who was German and she said I didn't probably have a good chance of finding them on the economy because the Germans don't do egg hunts like Americans do.  The problem is that the BX had eggs but as soon as they put them out they sell out.  That's the nature of 50,000 Americans shopping at the same store, I guess :o\

I know, I know, I could have easily ordered some online.  But I was in the middle of trying to pack for Dublin and then I was going to be gone all weekend and I just told Mom I was kind of resigning myself to no egg hunt this year.  Which is fine, since neither girl would notice or care. 

But my Mom got my back.  She sent a huge bag of plastic eggs for me.  Now I feel like I can give my girls that traditional experience of being a kid at Easter time.  Thanks, Mom!  It really means a lot! 

Which got me to thinking about how much I really do love that both our moms take such good care of us in the care package department.  Every time I go to the post office I feel like it's Christmas or something ;o)  We often have goodies waiting for us from Gram and Gigi.  And whenever I open a package I can't help but smile as we go through each item... thinking of Mom or Toni shopping for us, seeing things we'd like, thinking of our favorite candies.  It's so great... thank you both!

Here's a little video of us opening the package.  Lily was kind of not interested in looking at me with the camera, ha!

Easter Week Fun

Oh man you guys.  I'm so armed and dangerous with ideas of how to celebrate Easter right.  Pinterest is just amazing!  It's hard to choose what fun things to do!

For breakfast today we had this fun Easter Egg Bread that Nicole shared (hi Nicole!).  I used my no-knead bread dough (rye) and didn't color the eggs this time... but I think I might do colored ones later in the week.  Maybe for Good Friday.  It's so cool cause you  just put the eggs right into the oven (uncooked) with the bread and you get fresh baked bread and eggs for breakfast!  Lily called it EGGY BREAD ;o)

Next we made EGGY SHAKES... Easter Egg Maracas!  We used the leftover plastic eggs from the Christmas Kinder Eggs and I let them put the dry beans in.  Sam only tried to sneak two in her mouth.  Then I topped them off with rice and super glued them shut cause I don't trust those two.

This is what happened when she realized that I glued it shut.

"Geez Lily you can be such a drama-queen sometimes!"

"Shakeshakeshake, shakeshakeshake, shake your eggy, shake your eggy!"

Then we made our Easter Tree.  I cut a variety of branches from the yard and Lily helped me hang these cute little plastic eggs we found at Wasgau.  The Germans like to hang plastic eggs from their trees outside.

The perfectionist in me had to adjust her "six eggs to one branch" creation here ;o)

THEN I finished our Easter mobile that we started the other day.  (No I'm not superMom... I just know that today's one of the only days this week we have nothing going on so I filled it with crafts and fun.  The rest of the week will probably not see four Easter activities per day!)  

This idea is my ghetto/cheap version of the adorable one mentioned in this blog post of a baby shower.  When I say ghetto I mean it involved scotch tape and everything ;o)

But it still turned out to my liking.  I traced the shapes using our Easter cookie cutter set (thanks MIL!) and then had the girls color on them... which didn't turn out so well.  Jesse was laughing at me as I got more and more frazzled trying to get them to color on the shapes instead of play with the cutters.  Hehe oh well.  It was still a somewhat fun Mommy-Daughter memory :o)  I have more cutouts left so I might use the rest as window decals. 

Happy Easter week!