Happy Easter!

the beautiful magnolia tree in Grandpa's backyard


I hope this lovely Easter evening finds you all well. I had a great Easter weekend. How could I not with my family in town? That, and it was in the 80's today with not a cloud in the sky. Love it!

The weekend started with Good Friday services. I went alone, which was ok with me, especially after the part where I started crying. Something about the service moved me, I'm not quite sure what happened, but I sat there in the pew crying like a baby. Powerful stuff.

Saturday, I waited patiently for my family to arrive. They finally did late afternoon and I quickly learned that Alyssa (Kendall's other auntie) and I had been elected for baby duty while my sis, bro-in-law and parents took their house full of stuff to the storage place. Thinking I got the better end of the deal, I quickly agreed. Kendall is a sweetie, no doubt about that.....but now that she's walking, she's also hard to keep up with. You blink and she's gone, climbing stairs, pulling things off shelves, putting the dog's chew toy in her mouth. You know, the usual. I figured having BOTH aunties watch her would give us a leg up on the munchkin. I was wrong. Kendall rules the roost my friends. She really didn't want to play with her toys (not even the Dora ball I got her), she just wanted to climb the stairs...over and over and over again. Which is fine, except for the fact that she doesn't quite know how to get down them.....Auntie Alyssa and I made a pretty good team, we fed Miss Kendall her dinner (and Auntie Kerri even changed a poopy diaper-holla!), gave her her bottle when need be, and kept a close eye on her (especially when she wanted to go outside with the dogs. She LOVES the dogs. She belly laughs when they run past her-SO cute!). As it neared 8pm (which is her bedtime), we started wondering where mommy and daddy were because my sister wanted to give her her bath before bed (and kiddo needed it-let's just say she had ravioli for dinner and was sorta orange-stained). We got the bright idea to check our phones when Alyssa delivered the news-they were nowhere near done and she and I were gonna have to give Kendall a bath. Ummm.....I've never given a baby a bath before. About all I know is that they're slippery little critters in the water. But, we decided we could do this. Alyssa got the water ready and stripped the kid down while I dug through all of my sister's suitcases looking for jammies and Kendall's sleep sack (didn't find the sleep sack until she was already asleep). Munchkin screamed her head off the entire bath, either we weren't doing it right, or she missed her mommy and daddy or she was just SO sleepy.....or possibly all three. We finally got her down and in bed by 8:15 and within five minutes she was out. Aunt Kerri stayed upstairs in the room next door in case she needed anything (and rubbed her back to help her go back to sleep when she woke up crying). The fam didn't arrive back to the house until after 10. They were exhausted, as you can imagine. Then the 'rents and I had to drive all the way to Grandpa's house...it was after 11 when we got there.

Today we all went to church as a family for Easter. Kendall looked adorable in her little Easter dress that Grandma Val bought her (even if it was um, a bit tight). ;) After the service, we went back to Grandpa's house and took some family pics out in his backyard underneath his magnolia tree. Such a fun weekend. I'm so happy to have my family back in the STL, can't wait for all that fun we're gonna have! And I can't wait to see Kendall the birthday girl later this week.

Hope everyone had a fabulous Easter. Here are a couple pics (of the tons that I took this weekend).
Aunt Kerri's favorite little Easter bunny.

Me, my sis and my niece. I look obese standing next to my size 0 sister. And pigment-less. Good lord! My sis and Kendall look cute though!