Hoppy Easter

I am so far behind on blogging right now. Here are some cute pictures I took of Caroline as the Easter Bunny. She was not so sure what to do with the carrot. At first she cried and then she was curious.

Finally she decided to take a nibble.

This time we're ready!

Caroline is on the move and curious. Thank goodness the house is still baby proofed from Katherine. I remember with Katherine having to scurry to get all the cabinet latches on when she discovered them. Not this time. Caroline can try to her hearts content and she will not get in!


The cabinet latches allow the cabinets and drawers to open about 3 inches. That is just enough to get all of the dishtowels out. We probably should change where that drawer is. It is the only one that we got the latch on and it used to have BBQ tools. I really don't care if she gets into the towels.

Caroline quickly found the one cabinet that does not have a latch. We let Katherine play with all of the muffin tins and cookie sheets since we don't use them as much and they are not breakable or dangerous.

Now if only we could keep all the little toys that Katherine plays with off the ground . . .

Easter at the Arboretum

The day before Easter we went with my parents to the Arboretum. We had not all been for the spring festival yet and it was almost over. I expected it to be horribly crowded but it was not too bad. The girls wore their Easter dresses so that I could try to get some good pictures.

The Easter bunny was there for pictures. Katherine enjoyed seeing him but Caroline is not a fan of any character dressed up.

Usually Caroline is the photogenic child. She can usually be counted on for a great big smile. Today she was more interested in playing with the grass. No smiles.

Katherine, on the other hand, decided to be the model. She was posing in front of every flower. She would cock her head to the side and give a huge smile. I took way too many pictures mainly because she is so rarely this cooperative.

Toward the end she decided not too cooperate as much and turned her back. You can see though how long and pretty her hair has gotten. And no, I do not curl her hair. That is how it is naturally. I am so jealous.

Katherine loves to use my camera to take pictures. She actually took a pretty good picture of Nana and Pops. It is tilted to the side like a lot of photographers do.

This was our best sisters photo. It won't be hung on the wall. I don't know what they were looking at.

Katherine found a lady bug. That poor bug was with us for at least 15 minutes. It had deformed wings so it would not fly away. She carried it around and would get upset if she fell on the ground. We would all have to stop and look for her. She and Nana then found a bush with lots of lady bugs so they put her there to be with her mommy, daddy and grandparents.

As we were leaving Katherine asked us to take her picture again. She kept moving to different places for us to take more pictures. I don't know what was going on but I sure liked the cooperation.

Easter Sunday

Easter Sunday we went to church. Caroline was congested so I took her into the service with me. We were only about 5 minutes late for the service and not only was the main level full but so was the balcony. So, we had to sit in a balcony that is pretty much only open on Easter. I never even knew how to get there. Of course we were only in the service for about 10 minutes before I ended up taking Caroline to the cry room because she was getting talkative. It was maxed out with 10 babies, the most I have ever seen.

We worked in the nursery 3rd service and it was pretty light. I guess all the babies were in the cry room :)

After church we went to my parents house for hunting Easter eggs and lunch. As Katherine was the only child able to hunt it was all about her. She has learned that eggs have treats so she would find one, bring it to her basket, open it and eat whatever was in there before searching for the next egg. Luckily Nana put some bunny crackers, teddy grahams, stickers and other toys in the eggs so they were not all chocolate.

The girls also got Easter baskets with some small things in them. I don't really remember getting big Easter baskets full of presents but they sure market that now. Mostly Katherine got a few things for gardening with me and some Disney souvenirs that we had not given her yet.

We attempted to get a good family picture. Katherine is either fully cooperative and posing or she does not cooperate at all. you can see that we had to put up with a funny face picture and a sad face picture before we would get a real picture out of her.

Neighborhood Egg Hunt

One think that I love about our neighborhood is our Women's Club. It is a club that is original to the subdivision. There are monthly meetings where the ladies of the neighborhood just socialize. I have not been very involved the past 2 years (due to kids and travel) but it is fun. I certainly bring down the average age of the group too.

Some of the most fun events that the club does are the 4th of July parade and the Easter egg hunt. We all meet at one yard and the kids hunt for eggs. There were about 10-15 kids. Katherine was pretty excited when she discovered that the eggs have candy in them.

Final Disney Post

I am sure you are sick of hearing about our Disney vacation and this is my final post. We wrapped up the trip with some cuddle time reading stories with Nana and Pops before everyone went their own ways back home. Nana and Pops are adored by all 3 girls and it is so sweet to see them all on the couch together.

Monday our family had the last flight out so we had time for the pool. It was Caroline's first time to go swimming and she seemed to really enjoy it. Katherine is a little more cautious and stayed on the steps the entire time.

After swimming we headed to the airport. We got there with time to spare and found a great place for Katherine to run laps and burn off some energy. I was hoping that she would take a nap on the plane (she didn't).

Katherine has flown a lot but that did not seem to matter. She was horrible! She did not want to wear her seat belt at all. Before we got on the plane we talked about expectations. When I mentioned the seat belt she said, "Mommy, I don't have to wear the seat belt. I can sit on your lap. The pilot said." She has such a great memory. On our last flight the flight attendant did tell me I could hold her on my lap for landing because her ears were hurting and she was crying. Now Katherine thought she could do that any time. She would not sit still and she would not leave her seat belt on. She was screaming and thrashing about while Sam and I were struggling to get her quiet and still enough to buckle her up. Of course the plane is waiting to take off, the flight attendants are waiting for her to be buckled and everyone within about 10 rows is shooting me annoyed looks. I wanted to crawl under the seat. My mom told me that one time a family was removed form a plane because they could not get their toddler buckled in. I just knew that was going to happen to us. Finally we literally hold her down and hold the seat belt closed until we take off. After about 5 minutes she calmed down and did fine for the rest of the flight.

... Until she had to go to the bathroom on the plane. Sam took her and it did not go well. Someone else had left the place very dirty and she was scared to use the toilet. I can't blame her but apparently she threw one of her biggest fits in that tiny bathroom with Sam.

She is at a difficult age where tantrums can come out of the blue at any time. She was tired from a long trip. But, she still needs to cooperate and obey. One of the hardest things about traveling is that it is hard to discipline. Where do you take your child for a time out on an airplane? How do you have any kind of consequence? It was hard. As we were driving home we said we were never going on vacation again. A week later I am remembering more of the happy memories and I am sure we will travel again. If we fly, I will take her carseat so at least she is buckled into a 5 point harness that she can't unbuckle on her own.

I have had people ask me if I am glad we took the trip. It was hard and tiring but I am glad we went. I love to travel and have not yet let kids stop me from that. Disneyland is a place that is meant for kids and we were by no means the only ones there with babies and toddlers. But, I would say that it would have been easier if either my kids would have napped in the stroller or they no longer needed naps to stay happy. So, if you are thinking of going to Disneyland think about that. I think our next trip will be a little more low key, maybe a cabin in the woods or a all inclusive beach resort. Hmmmm, maybe it is time to start planning :)

Disney Day 3

Today was our last day at Disneyland. It has been a lot of fun though a lot of work. Packing up everything for the day and riding the shuttle to the park is a chore, especially since you have to fold up the stroller on the shuttle and then let security look through all of your bags.

I made cute outfits for the girls to wear. I decided that rather than buying a cheesy amusement park souvenir t-shirt or Mickey Mouse ears I would make them something that had Disney elements. I saw a few cute things on esty.com and decided to copy and make my own. So, I made pillowcase dresses for Katherine and Sophia that were red with white polka dots. They had black on the bottom and yellow rick-rack border so they were the colors of Minnie and Mickey Mouse. Sophia did not want to wear hers so we missed out on a cute matching picture. I was working on a jumper/pinafore top for Caroline because I knew she would keep untying the ribbon on a pillowcase dress but my sewing machine kept getting the thread tangled (I am a beginner and have no clue how to fix it). So at 3 am the night before our trip I gave up. I made her a cute shirt using "wonder under" and fabric scraps that had the same red and white polka dot with Mickey Mouse ears on it. They were really cute.

Nana really wanted to get a picture with Pops and the 3 kids. They (and mainly I mean Katherine) were not cooperative at all. First Katherine insisted on playing on the fence and not looking at the camera at all. Then I picked her up and tried to hide behind her for the picture.

We also tried to get a cute family picture but again, Katherine would not look at the camera.

After our morning in Toontown we went to ride "It's a Small World". We actually waited in line to ride it before Toontown and when we were the next ones to get on a boat they closed the ride because some of the animatronics were broken. That was a bummer. Luckily it did not take long to wait again.

They have recently redone the ride and added some of the Disney Characters. It was not as annoying as I remembered it from high school. Caroline loved the ride and was bouncing up and down the entire time.

Pops took Katherine for another ride on the teacups while the rest of us got snacks and took breaks. She had a lot of fun.

On the way out of the park we saw Mary Poppins again. She was almost able to get Katherine to dance with her. Katherine really enjoyed the live performances. I wish we had been able to see a parade but with time changes and nap schedules we never were there at the right time.

We went back for a late nap and never made it back to the park. We decided to end on a good note rather than try to push more into the day. We ate Cheesecake Factory in our hotel and swam in the pool.