Easter 2012

Easter this year was very low key; we stayed home and hosted an Easter meal with the Elders and a few implants to the area such as ourselves. I saw a sign that advertising an Easter Egg Hunt at a local church that was going to drop 30,000 Easter eggs from a helicopter. It sounded like a fun event so we decided to go. The hunt was advertised to start at 11am but when we showed up we learned that the actual Easter Egg Hunt was not going to happen until 1pm. We felt a little deceived and decided we were not going to sit around for 2 hours waiting for an egg drop that was scheduled to happen during Sophie’s naptime anyway. We ended up coming home and having a small personal egg hunt with Sophie, and then Stewart went hiking since it was his first day off he had had in a while.

On Saturday before bed we decided as a family to read the Easter Story in the scriptures to remember the true meaning of Easter. I think this will be a yearly tradition for us in our home. We also decided that the Easter bunny will come on Saturday morning before Easter so that we can keep the true Easter Spirit in our home on Easter Sunday. 

I taught the Young Women lesson on Easter Sunday and we read the Easter Story out of the Scriptures, the spirit was strong and I enjoyed the opportunity it gave me to strengthen my testimony of my Saviors atoning sacrifice in my behalf. I know that Christ lives and because of Him I too can live again, as well as be cleansed from my mistakes. 

We spent Easter Sunday itself here at home hosting a meal as mentioned above and then Skyping with our families. We had a good day, and feel so blessed to know the true meaning of the Easter season.

Pictures taken at the Easter Egg Hunt

Hunting Eggs with Sophie in our back yard

Sophie in her Easter Dress

Flowers

This post is by Stewart.
Back when I was younger I always wanted to be a groundskeeper for some wealthy English aristocrat with a large garden.  Unfortunately, I didn't know any wealthy English aristocrats so I had to stay in school.  I've never had the opportunity to indulge my green thumb before, and I don't really have time now, but the previous owners of this house sure did.  One of the things I like about this yard is that there are flowers of one kind or another blooming somewhere in the yard from now until late September or early October.  This is the last summer that we will live in this house so I want to document some of the pretty flowers.  Here is the start of my collection. 

Oh and, if any of you know any wealthy English aristocrats who are hiring a gardner please keep me in mind. 

Sophie Sophie Sophie

It is hard to believe that Sophie is now 17 months, it honestly feels like it was just a few days ago that we brought her home from the hospital. She sure is a joy in our lives and we feel extremely blessed to be her parents. Here are some fun pictures of Sophie, so you can see just a little bit about why we love this girl so much. 

Rocking out to... nothing, she is playing with Stewart's headphones that's all.

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In the laundry basket with all the warm jeans we just took out of the dryer. 

Looking at all flowers that have bloomed in this warm weather we have had over here. 

For Nancy

We had our Young Women New Beginnings last Wednesday and I wanted to post a little about our evening for Stewart’s (and my) Aunt Nancy who is the YW President in her ward. I put a lot of thought and work into this program; I am grateful for my wonderful counselors who stepped up and helped me pull all my written thoughts off the paper and make them into reality.

Since the theme for the youth this year is “Arise and Shine Forth” found in D&C 115:5, we decorated the tables with sources of lights.  

We used things such as lamps or flash lights, candles and so on. For refreshments we served Skittles and Starbursts along with fruit pizza. I also froze Kool Aid into ice cubes and served them with 7UP (believe it or not that was the biggest hit). 

As an YW Presidency we wanted to encourage our YW to read the Book of Mormon this year, so we gave all our YW a Book of Mormon. Because we wanted to do something a little more to dress the books up, I made book covers with their names on them and fastened them with a red pen, I think they turned out good. I also gave the YW a charge to look for examples of people in the Book of Mormon who exemplified the theme this year of Arise and Shine. I really hope they take our invitation to read the Book of Mormon seriously, I know if they do they will be blessed. 

All in all the program went well, although we did not have as many people there as we had planned for.  

Family Hike

A few weeks ago Stewart heard of a trail that took you out to the New River George with a great view of the New River George Bridge. We went and looked at the bridge back in August if you want to know a little more about the bridge and why it is special you can click here to go back to the first time I blogged about it. Anyway, we decided to take a hike as a family and go see bridge again and the George. I am glad we did, the view was amazing and will be even more spectacular in the summer or fall when all the trees have leaves. Here are a few pictures from our adventure. I have some videos as well, but since blogger changed it wont let me upload any videos so if anyone has any tips send them my way please. 

 Here is the bridge in all it's splendor 

 Stewart, Sophie and I standing on a cliff overhang. Yep that's right, there was no fence just an out cropping of the cliff where you could stand and view the scenery.

Sophie and I posing for a picture after our hike. 

Reading

We moved Sophie out of her crib and into a ‘Big Girl Bed’ a few weeks ago in hopes that it would help her sleep better thru the night… it worked! She LOVES her bed and I find her in her room playing on her bed several times during the day. One of her favorite things to do on her bed is read, I catch her reading all the time, and it makes my heart smile. 

Sophie sleeping in her bed the first night... she is in there I promise.  

I went to get Sophie, after her nap and this is what I found... I don't know if she even took a nap.  

Here she is again.... reading, on her bed :)