Easter Up North 2013

 After all the fun we had yesterday, the kids were slow to get up this morning.  Owen was the first one up, as usual.  He grabbed this hat off the top of his Easter basket, scoped out a few Easter eggs and then went to wake the rest of the crew.  That wasn't an easy job.

 We finally got Evan up.  Once his eyes were open, he went right to work, collecting eggs.  This is his favorite part of Easter.

 Owen found a well camouflaged egg in with the oranges.

 Finally they made it to the baskets.

 Owen was thrilled to find a video game, "Wreck-It Ralph" and a Milwaukee Bucks T-shirt in with his candy.

 

 Mia went straight to work on her chocolate.  Before long she was in The Sweet Zone.

 

 Evan was still really tired.  He played Bumpa's ipad after everyone had gone to sleep.  Unexplainable tears were shed.

 Ya-ya came to the rescue.

 

 Soon, he meandered back to finding eggs and his smile came back.

Mia spent the morning in "The Zone."

Hoppy Easter Kris Kross Style

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Surprise Birthday for Great-Aunt Sarah

 Today was Jim's birthday.  Although we were mostly going to be celebrating my Great-Aunt Sarah today, we wanted to make it a little special for him too.  Jim doesn't care much about gifts.  Hand-written cards with thoughtful sentiments are more his style.

 After he opened a few gifts, my mom & I headed over to the hotel to set up for Great Aunt Sarah's surprise birthday party.  We've been working on this for a couple of months.  We had to send out secret invitations.  Mom organized the location with brunch to be catered, tablecloths, and cupcakes.  My Dad's cousin Betty was going to be visiting, so they used that as an excuse to get together for an "Easter" brunch.  Our family is good at following directions, so everybody was there on time and hid in the corner.

 We met Sarah at the front door and walked in to the " new restaurant" to be seated.  She was totally surprised!

 

 And my folks felt so good about organizing the celebration for her.  Sarah is always so selfless.  She always attends everyone's events, she is an amazing listener, completely calm and only has kind words to say...

...and the turnout showed how much she is loved.

 It also happens that tomorrow is Easter, so my sweet Aunt Penny felt she needed to bring bags of candy to share with my kids.

 It must be fun to be the Great-Aunt.  "You want a bag of candy?  Sure!  You want another cupcake?  Here you go sweetie."  And when I caught her, she just smiled an innocent smile and shrugged her shoulders.

 My mom asked family members to send pictures of themselves with Sarah.  She & my dad scanned them, sent them to me and I put them into a book that we gave to Sarah as a gift.

 It turned out really nice and everyone enjoyed looking at it.  This is a photo of my dad & his sister, Penny, looking on as Sarah looks through the pages.

 Betty & Ed brought Sarah

 Jim & Jerry

Mia kept careful watch over Jerry's son Jessup's newest addition, Bert.

 

 Chantel, my cousin Jody's daughter, with Sarah.

 We sang Happy Birthday and, after an unnecessary and loud request from me, Sarah gave a little thank you speech.

 Bumpa got some Mia snuggles.

 Jerry's daughter, Aimee, with Sarah

 Mia & Jessup's daughter, Lola, couldn't resist these pom poms for one more minute, but they were just out of reach.  Luckily Auntie Aimee came to the rescue.

 But siblings, no matter what the age, sometimes have trouble resisting the temptation to hit each other.

 Owen jumped in the action.

 After they burned up their extra energy, we snapped a family photo.

 We headed back to my folks' place for appetizers, pizza & drinks.  This is Sarah's brother-in-law & sister-in-law, Don & Karen.  This would be my Grandpa's youngest brother.  They have a special anniversary coming up this summer.

 Mia warmed up to Don right away.

 It was really nice of my folks to have everyone over so we could continue catching up.

 Sarah was worried about her dog, Major, so she brought him along.  He got a little overwhelmed and nipped Mia on the lip.  Sarah was very good at helping Mia understand and realize that Major is really a good dog who just got scared.

 Although Mia kept talking about what happened, she isn't afraid of Major.  We have a lot of dogs in the neighborhood, so I'm glad we dodged a fear.

 Jessup & our kids played together really well.

 Owen is such a sweetie with babies.

 Mom whipped up Jim's favorite dessert, so we ended the night we another birthday celebration.

Happy 80th to Sarah and Happy 38th to Jim!

Love you both!!!

Getting Ready for Easter

 We're Up North!  And we're getting ready for Easter.  There's lots to do.  First we have to decorate these Easter cookies.

 I'm not sure Owen will even eat frosted carrots.

 But, while we were busy, a visitor arrived.

 And then a couple more.

 This group of deer came in every day while we were there.  Sometimes twice!

 After the cookies were done, we dyed Easter eggs.

 Mia concentrated very hard while putting Tinkerbell stickers and wings on her eggs.

 Evan had been waiting all week to make hairy eggs.

 I think Owen would grow a goatee like this if he could.

OK  I think we're ready for Easter.  Bring it on!

Letts Family Skate Party

This weekend Connie planned a skate, swim, sleepover party for all of us.  We started out at the skate rink.  This is the last weekend it is open.

 Owen is really getting into skating this year.

We could hardly keep him off the ice.  When everyone else was ready to move on to swimming, Owen still wanted to skate for another hour.  He does need some practice.  Currently his skating looks more like running to keep from falling on his face.

Evan still has a long way to go in the way of balance, but he likes skating with help.

My back was killing me by the end of the day.

Zamboni = time for snacks.

The kids lined up on the edge to watch the zamboni skid by.

I hadn't realized how much Evan had grown this winter until he was hugging Addie.  I looked down to see if they both had skates on.  Yep.  It's amazing considering his diet still consists of fruit, granola bars, cereal and yogurt.

Mia did a little skating, but mostly she and Margaux colored and warmed the rest of us up.

Gina didn't join the skaters this year because she's expecting a baby!  We will have one more boy in the family come summer.