Easter Fun!

This was Tralee's second Easter, and the first one she got into a little bit. This was especially exciting for her Mommy and Daddy.

Saturday afternoon we headed over to Jim's Uncle house in Eagle where he was hosting the annual Easter Egg Hunt. Usually Tricia does it, but she as out of town, so Dave and his wife Becky took it upon themselves to host this event. We really appreciate them for doing this, as we all had a lot of fun. Here is Tralee and two of her second cousins traipsing off to find some fun before the Easter Egg Hunt. Here is Tralee playing in the sand before finding eggs. You can see some eggs in the background.

In case you don't know, Jim's Mom comes from a family of twelve kids. Eleven girls, and one boy. Dave is the ONE boy. Each of the original twelve have kids, and some of their kids have kids. So, when you plan a party on that side of the family LOADS of people show up. Some that I don't even know all that well, and I've been married into the family for almost six years. Heck. . . Jim doesn't even know some of his cousins all that well either. Anyways, the Easter Egg Hunt was no exception to the quantity of people you would expect from such a large family. Good thing everyone was prepared, and there were enough eggs for everyone.

Dave and Becky have a nice big house, and a nice big yard to go with it. So, there was enough room for everyone, and enough room to hide TONS AND TONS of eggs. The upper part of their back yard was designated for children six and under, while the bottom yard was for kids seven and over. As soon as we got the okay, Jim and I took Tralee to search for eggs.


I was surprised at how quickly Tralee understood what to do. I mean, she's only 14 months old, and as soon as we showed her an egg and told her to put it in her basket, she walked right over to it, and did what was asked. After a while we didn't have to tell her what to do, she just figured it out on her own. We pointed to eggs for her, but she did the rest of the work. WHAT A SMARTY PANTS!! I love the picture above. She's so proud of all her eggs! We only ran into troubles after she discovered that there was candy in each egg. So, instead of searching, she just wanted to eat her treasure after each egg was found. We had to keep her moving, or she might not have discovered all that many eggs. And lets face it, Jim and I wanted her to find eggs not only for her, but because there were Bottle Caps in some of them, and we LOVE bottle caps! In the end Tralee did all right. She really enjoyed herself! Here is a collage of her picking up and egg and transferring it into her basket.
These next two are some of my favorite pictures from the day. Jim is helping Tralee find eggs in the tree. Look at how happy Tralee's face is!!



When all the eggs were found (it took all of 15 minutes or so) it was time for dinner. Everyone was asked to bring something, so there was plenty of food. Dave and Becky supplied the hot dogs and hamburgers, and everyone ate a nice lunch.


After I had a sufficient amount of grub, I visited with some of Jim's cousins while Jim and some more cousins played volleyball, while kids ran around, jumped on the tramp, and others visited. We left after a while, and I must say the Easter Egg Hunt was a success! Tralee was pooped!

Easter Morning Tralee woke us up. We decided to put out her little Easter Basket with some goodies in the middle of our living room floor and let her discover it on her own. I hoped she would do it before church, because "the Easter Bunny" put some healthy snacks in there for her to eat while at church. She found it, and disregarded the healthy snacks and went right for the chocolate! She's a girl after her daddy's heart! Jim's the chocoholic in this family. I can take it or leave it. More often than not I'll take it, but Jim goes through withdrawals if he doesn't get chocolate all that often. I think we decided that from now on we might do the Easter Bunny thing on Saturday, and save Sunday for the gospel aspect of Easter. We'll see.

Easter afternoon Jim's Aunt Nona (the eldest of the original 12) invited us over for Easter Dinner. Some of her kids and their kids were there. It was a nice bunch, and Jim's Grandma Callister even showed up. She's the one that was brave enough to have 12 kids in the first place. We asked her what some of her favorite Easter memories were. She explained that she and her sister ALWAYS got a nice Easter dress. She also explained that her favorite treat from her Easter Basket was a candy called "Chicken Bones." Ever heard of it? She said it was like a peanut buttery, flaky candy. Hmmm. . . sounds interesting.
Oh. . . I have to note that at church on Sunday, Tralee saw some kids holding Easter eggs, and she ran up to them all excited. She must have remembered Saturday's festivities. She looked a little forlorn when the kids didn't hand over their eggs to her. There's always next year Tralee.

So, that pretty much sums up our Easter.