A Weekend Full of Food, Family, and Easter Eggs!

We had a wonderful weekend! It was a busy one, but wonderful!

Friday, being Good Friday, the kids didn’t have school and Bill had the day off. The same goes for today. I went to see our friend Steve in the morning on Friday. He’s in a nursing home about an hour away. I enjoyed the drive to and from, and got to listen to my new Dierks Bentley cd uninterrupted! 🙂 Steve looked well, however I can tell his health has declined a little since the last time I saw him. He was excited that I had a half-dozen of his favorite doughnuts, Casey’s doughnuts, in my hand. He ate three of them while I was there! I’m glad to see he still has his appetite! 🙂 It did my heart good to see him!

Zach chose for us to go out for pizza Friday night, which was a blast! The kids were so hilarious during dinner! I’m not sure what got into them, but at one point we all couldn’t stop laughing! Have you ever tried to stifle laughter, and you just can’t? That is what we were experiencing! We came home after picking up a few groceries and watched one of our older movies, The Country Bears. It’s certainly a children’s movie, but we sure had some great laughs through it!

Saturday Zach refereed two morning soccer games, while Ali and I stayed home and got things ready for our dinner Saturday night. My brother Pat’s family came over around 2:00ish to do our annual egg coloring, and to spend some extra time together. (I will have to make another post this week about what we do with our annual Easter eggs…it’s pretty hilarious and has been a tradition with Pat for many, many years.) My brother Steve and his family joined us at dinner time, after my sixteen year-old nephew Matt

was in a farm accident. He caught his left index finger in a pulley, and almost lost his finger! I pray he’s doing ok today! Keep in mind that Pat’s family and ours pretty much started grazing through the appetizers and snack

s shortly after 2pm–I felt we ate our way through the day! Then we had dinner after our grazing! Ugh! NOT GOOD for the waistline! 🙂 After dinner the kids hunted for 147 Easter eggs outside. They had so much fun!

We all had a great time together, except for the fact of Matt being injured. We shared lots of laughs,

lots of memories (especially when we all tried to choke down a candy-coated marshmallowly, sugary egg–the kind that we used to get as kids!), and we ate WAY too much food! It was a wonderful evening…one I won’t soon forget!

The kids woke up Easter morning to their Easter baskets and to another chocolate Easter egg hunt inside our home. 🙂 (Like they really needed MORE candy!) Church was awesome! It was fun for both Ali and I to speak at church yesterday. It was a joy for me seeing her in front of the congregation talking…and doing it well! I was SO impressed! 🙂 I love that the Mission has such a diverse crowd there each Sunday! Yesterday was no exception! The service really made our Easter extra-special!

We went to my mother and father-in-law’s for a late brunch after church. Again, MORE FOOD! My mother-in-law is such an outstanding cook! It was nice to spend time with them, Bill’s brother Mike and his family, and his sister Laurie and her family. We came home mid-afternoon and “hung out” the rest of the day. It was a wonderful weekend!

We will all be home today, which will be very nice! I’m thankful

today for Easter. I’m thankful for the great weekend we had. I’m thankful for my family. I’m thankful that we can be home today! 🙂 And yes, I WILL get my workout in this morning (especially since I ate so much food over the weekend)! I have to get a “star” today! 🙂