Easter in H-Town

Lincoln at the Hooper Park Easter egg hunt. I think the lighting in this pic is really cool.

Friday night we headed up to Hooper to spend Easter/Conference weekend with my family. We got stuck in rush hour on the way there, so it was time to put the kids right to bed when we got there. Lincoln woke up in the middle of the night, about 1am because he was constipated. Aaron and I sat up with him for about an hour, but couldn't get anything we tried to work so that he would poop. I was afraid (since all 4 of us were sharing a room downstairs) that if we put him back to bed, he'd be up in another few minutes screaming again that he needed to go, and we didn't want him to wake up Ivan. So, I ended up snuggling up with him in my mom's big leather chair upstairs. He fell immediately asleep, and was even snoring. I on the other hand, had no such luck. I lay there with him until about 4am, at which point I decided that he wasn't going to wake up to poop. I carried him back downstairs and we both went to bed.

Ivan with his Easter bucket

Despite an almost sleepless night, we decided to get up early (hey, I'm pregnant, 8:00 is early!) and head over to the Hooper park for the Easter egg hunt. It was freezing outside! We all had coats on and everything, but I could not believe how cold it was. And the wind did not help. We found the line for the under age 3 group and stood in it for a little bit. Then they had us go inside the fence and line up all around the fence. When they yelled go, we were off. I had Ivan and Aaron had Lincoln. We got seperated really quickly. Unlike some of the parents there, our philosophy was to let our kids find the eggs and candy on the ground. Lincoln did awesome, and so did Ivan for his age. Both of the boys got a few pieces of candy and at least one egg. Since it was unbelieveabley cold, and we'd already seen the Easter bunny yesterday, we decided to skip out on the long line and head home.

Between the two sessions of Conference, Lincoln and I got hair cuts. Thanks Mom! It's so nice to have a professional whose willing to cut your hair for a very low rate (like free). While the boys were at Priesthood session Mom, Steph, Lincoln and I (and Ivan crawled around our feet) decorated eggs. A little while ago, I let Lincoln pick out our egg coloring kit. He picked one that came with the accessories to make your eggs into monsters. Not surprised.

I made Linc take his shirt off to do the dye, because he insisted on putting the eggs into the colors himself. While we waited for the eggs to dry so we could dress them up like monsters, we popped popcorn and watched The Frog Princess. My boys were all over the popcorn. They thought it was great stuff. As for The Princess and the Frog, I wasn't really impressed. Sure it was cute, and had a few funny lines, and the music I liked a lot. But...the villian, Shadow Man, I thought was a little too over-the-top dark and scary for young viewers, like Lincoln. Especially the parts where the shadows can grab and capture other shadows. And the whole voodoo thing....ya, not so much. Not a big fan. Definitely not on my top ten list of favorite Disney movies.  

Aunt Steph, Lincoln, and Krystal with our monster eggs

While I put Ivan to bed, Mom and Steph and Linc worked on the monster eggs. I came back upstairs in time to help them finish up. I think they turned out so cute! I wish I would have taken a picture of all of them. Here's one I got a close up of.

Sunday was a nice relaxing day. We had a delicious french toast breakfast, watched Conference, did Easter baskets and a fun egg hunt in the back yard (which I didn't get any pictures of, but the boys did great.) and started a new tradition of reading the story of the resurrection out of the scriptures. That was Mom and Kerry's idea, and I love it! I think we'll have to keep that tradition going once we start having Easter with just our little family. Then we watched another session of conference, and got ready for the big dinner. Ever since I was little, my dad would always serve lamb on Easter Sunday. I'm really glad Mom and Kerry have kept that tradition going. Not only because it reminds me of my dad, but because lamb is SO GOOD! While some of us worked on dinner, Kyle and his fiance Kelsey, and Tanner took Lincoln outside to play basketball and jump on the tramp.

I'm really excited for Kelsey to be a part of our family. She fits right in with all of us crazy people. I think Kyle was the one who said it best when he said, "Ya, it's pretty hard to find someone who gets along with both Krystal and Jackson, but Kelsey does." He's right. Lincoln loves her. He's always way more excited to see Kels than Kyle, which is saying something because he really likes Kyle.  And of course, most importantly ;) Kels is a baseball fan. And although she roots for the Red Sox, it could be a lot worse, so we'll let that slide...for now. Kyle and Kelsey are getting married August 4th. Yup, 3 days before my due date. That will be an adventurous experience for sure. Best case senario, I have the baby a week early on July 31st, worst case, I really don't want to think about it. How many babies do you think have been born at a temple sealing?

Here's the whole fam (minus Bryan, Emily, and Penny Sparks who live in San Diego, and Jackson who was doing some security system training in Vegas, and Mom and Kerry who are taking the picture) Baby Graham, Tanya and Nelson Strong, Kelsey, Kyle, Aaron, Ivan (who you can't see), Lincoln, Me, Tanner, Kirk and Steph Hilton.

Ivan and Lincoln Swan at Easter dinner in Hooper, UT 2010